Some Actors 



Our Lord's Passion 



IBy HERMANN ULIENTHAL 




Class IK 

Book_ , L6 

Gojjyright^I 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSrr. 



Some Actors 



in 



Our Lord's Passion 



By ^e-vw^LaXfi. 

LILIENTHAl! 

Author of "Lent — Past and Present ' 



REV. HERMAN1S LILIENTHALJ M.A 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 
THE RT. REV. THOMAS MARCH CLARK, D.D., L.L.D. 

Bishop of Rhode Island and Presiding Bishop 



NEW YORK 
THOMAS WHITTAKER 

2 AND 3 BIBLE HOUSE 
1903 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS, 

Two Copies Received 

MAR 9 1903 

& Copynght Entry 
CLASS OU XXo. No. 

SU- ? *h h 

COPY B. 



<&<> 



Copyright, 1903, 
By Thomas Whittaker 



THE CAXTON PRESS 
NEW YORK. 



My Companion in Thought, 

My Helpmeet in Life, 

I Inscribe 

This Book. 



Introduction 

THERE are many people who, when they 
read anything which seems to them par- 
ticularly heavy and wearisome, are apt to say, 
" It is as dull as a sermon " ; but if all discourses 
were like those contained in this book, one 
would be more likely to say of what pleased 
them, " It is as interesting as a sermon." 

The writer paints with his pen, and the lights 
and shadows are so adjusted, that the figures 
stand before us with wondrous vividness, while 
the men he describes are prominent actors in 
the most solemn and eventful transaction which 
ever took place on earth. 

The first subject fills us with horror and we 
wonder how it was possible for Judas to have 
found entrance into the household of Jesus and, 
for so long a time, to have remained there, but 



Introduction 



the careful and discriminating analysis of his 
character helps us to solve the mystery. 

The history of Peter also is told in such a way 
as to make clear the inconsistencies of his con- 
duct — while that of Pontius Pilate is so search- 
ing and thorough as to destroy any doubts as to 
his real desire and intentions and to justify the 
perpetual recalling of his name in our Creed — 
since he was chief among the murderers of our 
Lord. 

The sketches of Herod and Barabbas are drawn 
with wonderful fidelity and in a manner which 
impresses our minds with the terrible wicked- 
ness of the men who controlled the events of 
this period, and the horrible degradation of the 
people who chose that the robber Barabbas 
should be pardoned and the Holy Jesus crucified. 

I wish that these discourses might be read in 
every parish during Lent, for they have touched 
me more deeply than any sermons which I have 
ever read, and since I am in my ninety-first year 
this is saying a great deal. 

They must appeal to the young as well as to 



Introduction 



the mature mind — because of their simplicity 
and the dramatic interest with which every sub- 
ject is surrounded : and will be listened to by a 
class of people who are not ordinarily moved by 
appeals from the pulpit. 

I wish that the book might not only fall into 
the hands of every intelligent layman for private 
perusal, but be placed on the study table of all 
the clergymen of the Church, since no one can 
fail to be impressed, in heart and conscience 
with the truths embodied here, or not be im- 
pelled with a great desire to convey to others 
the solemn lessons contained in these discourses. 

The sermons for Good Friday and Easter must 
especially bring us very near to Christ and fill 
us with a profound sense of the terrible emer- 
gency which brought Him down to earth and 
nailed Him to the Cross on Calvary. 

Thomas M. Clark. 

Bishops House, 

Providence, R. I., 

December 5th, igo2. 



Preface 

" C OME Actors in Our Lord's Passion " is a 
w_} course of Sermons preached in Lent, 1902, 
in Christ Church, Hartford, Conn. To complete 
the theme there are added two sermons — one for 
Good- Friday, and one for Easter-day — preached 
in connection with the same course. At the re- 
quest of friends these sermons are now given a 
wider circulation. 

It is to be noted that these are sermons, not 
essays, preached, not read, hence the retention 
of the direct address. 

The author, finally, desires to return his sincere 
thanks to the venerable and revered Bishop of 
Rhode Island, and Presiding Bishop of the 
Church, who admitted the author a candidate for 
orders, and advanced him to the Priesthood, and 
now has kindly written a word of introduction 
for these sermons preached from the pulpit of 



x Preface 

the parish of which the Bishop was himself 

sometime rector, thus strengthening the former 

bond of association, both with the parish and 

the author. 

H. L. 

Hartford, Conn., 

December, igo2. 



Contents 



J U1JA3 


Matt, xxvi : 24, 25. 


1 » 




II 




Peter 


Luke xxii: 61, 62. 
Ill 


23 J- 


Caiaphas . 


John xi : 49, 50. 


43 




IV 




Pontius Pilate 


Matt, xxvii : 24. 

V 


63 , 


Herod 


Luke xxiii : 8, 9. 
VI 


85 


Barabbas 


John xviii : 39, 40. 


105 



xii Contents 



VII 

The Meaning of the Cross (Good 

Friday) 125 

John xix : 18. 

VIII 

Christ's Resurrection the Answer to 
the Enigma of Death (An Easter 

Sermon) 141 

1 Cor. xv : 22. 



I 

Judas 



Some Actors in Our Lord's 
Passion 



Mnbas 

The Son of Man goeth as it is written of Him, but woe unto 
that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed ! It had been 
good for that man if he had not been born. Then Judas which 
betrayed Him answered and said, Master, is it I ? He said 
unto him, thou hast said. — Matthew xxvii: 24, 25. 

THE destiny of the human race is centred 
in the agony of Gethsemane, and the 
tragedy of Calvary. And of the actors in that 
awful drama few present a more weird and 
tragic character than Judas the betrayer of his 
Master. 

We are apt to think of Judas as some monster 
incarnate, to be spoken of with bated breath, as 
3 



4 Judas 

if he were outside the pale of humanity, and not 
to be reckoned in the category of ordinary mor- 
tals. And yet he was a babe as we all have 
been ; he once was fondled by a tender mother. 
He had looked up into her face with innocent 
love. He had grown up in childish guileless- 
ness, mingling with other boys, enjoying their 
games, their interests, their studies, their joys. 
No mark of Cain was branded on that innocent 
forehead then. He grew up, we may infer from 
his after history, an active, promising, enthusi- 
astic and shrewd young man. 

Then one day across the path of the young 
man comes the Rabbi of Galilee, Jesus of Naz- 
areth. Crowds w r ere following Him, attracted 
by His miracles, and His teaching. He — Judas 
— will join the throng, he too will see whether 
he may not have a share in the glories of the 
coming kingdom of which he heard so much. 
If he is to gain any position in the new king- 
dom, it will not do to hang on the outer fringe 
of the multitude, he must become more closely 
attached to this new prophet reputed to be the 



Judas 5 

Son of David, the promised Messiah. Already 
this prophet is selecting His special followers 
and disciples — those who are to be His intimate 
companions — he, Judas, must therefore belong to 
this inner circle. He will attract the teacher of 
Nazareth by displaying his eagerness to be 
enrolled ; he will offer his services, his allegiance. 
A doubtful tradition tells us that Judas is the 
disciple who offered his services to Jesus, saying, 
" Lord, I will follow Thee whithersoever Thou 
goest," and as if to deter him Jesus replied, 
" Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have 
nests, but the Son of Man hath not where to lay 
His head." As a matter of fact, however, we 
know that Judas Iscariot, i. e., the man of 
Kerioth, was enrolled among the Twelve, that 
inner body of disciples who followed their 
Master everywhere. In this connection it is 
interesting to note that Judas is the only one of 
the Twelve who is not a Galilean, but that he 
comes from Judaea. 

As the history of this little band proceeds, we 
find that Judas becomes their treasurer, he bears 



6 Judas 

the bag. Doubtless he had shown some financial 
efficiency. His southern training may have made 
him more prudent. Perhaps he could make the 
money go farther, and last longer. Perhaps he 
was not so generous to the needy as any other 
of the disciples would be ; anyhow, he must 
have shown some qualifications for the office, 
and so is honored with the trust. He was what 
the world might call wise, prudent, judicious, 
economical. 

At first everything goes well. Crowds flock 
to the teacher of Nazareth. It is quite possible 
that the hopes which urged Judas to join the 
Galilean band will be fulfilled. Miracles are 
wrought which show that his Master possesses a 
power greater than any heretofore possessed of 
man. The enthusiasm of the people increases, 
so that after the feeding of the Five Thousand, 
the people would take Jesus by force and make 
Him a king. This is a crucial point in Christ's 
career. Now can be fulfilled His claims of 
Messiahship — now He can rule on the throne of 
David His father. The tide of popularity is at 



Judas 7 

its height. Let Him float Himself upon it 
while it is turning His way. But strange — 
passing strange — so far from yielding to the 
popular desire and wish, Jesus withdraws Him- 
self. He refuses to be made a king. What can 
it mean ? The people are amazed, dumbfounded. 
Can it be that after all this Galilean prophet is an 
impostor, is no Messiah, is no Son of David, is 
not the promised king ? Jesus shrinks now from 
popular attempts to advance Him, retires more 
and more from public notice ; and soon the tide 
which had been running His way turns. He is 
doubted by the people, the crowds leave Him, 
some of His disciples turn back from following 
Him ; while His enemies, the Pharisees, the chief 
priests, and rulers become bolder. Now they 
begin to plot against His life. 

All this change, this rising to and waning 
from popularity takes place before the eyes of 
Judas. He had come to join what he thought a 
successful political and national movement, by 
which he was to be advanced to station and 
power. He had cast all he had into this cause ; 



8 Judas 

his means, his calling, his hopes of advancement, 
his life. Were his hopes, then, all a delusion ? 
Was he to be disappointed? Was there to be 
no earthly kingdom after all ? He listens to his 
Master's teaching ; he watches His actions. 
Alas ! what a disenchantment. He begins to 
see that the kingdom of heaven is quite differ- 
ent from what he had expected. He has been 
misled, deceived. But he will at least try to get 
something out of his connection. Out of the 
wreck of fortune he will save something. 

Notice how this thought, this feeling begins 
to work. He kept the bag. Here at least is 
one opportunity. None know what they have. 
And now Judas begins to steal. We are told 
plainly, he is a thief. 

But matters grow worse. Instead of regaining 
lost ground his Master seems to be losing. The 
people — the mob so easily turned and moved, 
worked upon and used as an instrument — is now 
turning in the direction of the rulers ; why 
should not he? His disillusionment and disap- 
pointment are complete. His stealing has be- 



Judas 9 

gun his downward course. Deterioration of 
character sets in rapidly. His Master had in 
many ways, at many times by words and acts, 
by parables, by allusions, tried to win back this 
disciple so fast losing his loyalty ; even at the 
last when it seemed hopeless to do anything 
more, yet the Lord in that upper chamber 
stooped to wash the feet of him who was only 
too soon to betray Him. But all to no effect. 
Satan had entered into the heart of Judas. He 
was now hopelessly committed to the enemies 
of his Master. He could not and would not ac- 
cept any endeavor to recall him to allegiance. 
Alas ! Up from that table where were broken 
the sacred symbols, he rises to complete his 
perfidy, and hastens to arrange the betrayal of 
his Master, — and all for the paltry pittance of 
thirty pieces of silver, for less than $20. 

Then comes the awful scene of the Garden of 
Gethsemane : when this one, chosen from a 
number, this one of the Twelve comes with 
officers and a band, and betrays his Master with 
a kiss. Oh to think that the token of closest 



10 Judas 

love and affection should be used for the purpose 
of the basest and most shameful treachery and 
betrayal. 

But the end is not yet. The trial of Jesus soon 
convinces Judas that he has perpetrated a most 
perfidious crime. Now comes the awakening, 
the awakening to the horror of his deed. Is it 
too late now for retrieval ? Can he undo his 
crime ? What now shall he — Judas — do ? Might 
he seek Him whom he had betrayed? Might 
he not cast himself at the feet of Jesus and even 
after his infamous treachery be forgiven? He 
might. But despair, remorse hinder him, crush 
him. Hope has withered in his soul. " The 
road, the streets, the people's faces, all seemed 
now to bear witness against him, and for Jesus. 
He read it everywhere. He felt it always ; he 
imagined it till his whole being was in flame. 
What had been, what was, what would be ! 
Heaven and earth receded from him ; there were 
voices in the air, and pangs in the soul — and no 
escape, help, counsel, or hope anywhere." Oh, 
so terrible is remorse and despair. 



Judas 1 1 

Now began the dread lash of conscience so 
long lulled to sleep. Judas was still a human 
being, he still had a conscience working in him. 
This he had not bargained for when he bar- 
gained for the money. And now that he had 
betrayed his Lord, to use the words of Eder- 
sheim " that night in Gethsemane would never 
more pass from his soul. In the thickening and 
encircling gloom all around, he must have ever 
seen only the torchlight glare as it fell on the 
pallid face of the Divine Sufferer. In the ter- 
rible stillness of the storm he must have ever 
heard only these words — ' Judas ! betrayest thou 
the Son of Man with a kiss ? ' He did not hate 
Jesus then — he hated nothing, he hated every- 
thing. He was utterly desolate as the storm of 
despair swept over his disenchanted soul, and 
swept him before it. No one in heaven or on 
earth to appeal to; no one — angel or man, to 
stand by him ! He must get rid of those thirty 
pieces of silver, which like thirty serpents coiled 
around his soul with terrible hissing of death. 
Then at least his deed would have nothing of 



1 2 Judas 

the selfish in it; only a terrible error, a mistake 
to which he had been incited by these San- 
hedrists. Back to them with the money, and let 
them have it again ! 

" And so forward he pressed amid the wonder- 
ing crowd, which would give way before that 
haggard face with the wild eyes that crime had 
made old in those few hours, till he came upon 
that knot of priests and Sanhedrists, perhaps 
at that very moment speaking of it all. Not even 
the priests who had paid him the price of blood 
would have aught of him, as with hoarse cry he 
sobbed — ' I have sinned in that I have betrayed 
innocent blood ! ' They turned from him with 
impatience, and in contempt reply, ' What is that 
to us, see thou to it ! ' Thus they sent him 
reeling back into his darkness. For a moment 
he stared wildly before him, the very thirty 
pieces of silver still clutched in his hand. For a 
moment only, and then he wildly rushed forward 
towards the sanctuary itself, he bent forward, 
and with all his might hurled from him those 
thirty pieces of silver, so that each resounded as 



Judas 1 3 

it fell on the marble pavement. Then out he 
rushed from the Temple, out of Jerusalem into 
solitude ! Whither shall it be ? Down into the 
horrible solitude of the valley of Hinnom, the 
Tophet of old, with its ghastly memories, with 
its ghostly associations. But it was not solitude, 
for it seemed now peopled with figures, faces, 
sounds. Across the valley, and up the steep 
sides of the mountain ! Here jagged rocks 
rise perpendicularly; perhaps there was some 
gnarled, bent, stunted tree. Up there he climbed 
to the top of that rock. Now slowly and de- 
liberately he unwound the long girdle that held 
his garment. It was the girdle in which he had 
carried those thirty pieces of silver. He was 
now quite calm and collected. With that girdle 
he will hang himself on that tree close by, and 
when he has fastened it, he will throw himself 
off from that jagged rock. It is done. . . . 
And now he is going deeper, farther out into the 
night — to its farthest bounds, where rises and 
falls the dark flood of death. The wild howl of 
the storm has lashed the dark waters into fury ; 



M 



Judas 



they toss and break in wild billows at his feet. 
One narrow rift in the cloud-curtain overhead, 
and in the pale deathlike light lies the figure of 
the Christ, so calm, so placid, untouched and 
unharmed on the storm-tossed waters, as it had 
been that night lying on the lake of Galilee when 
Judas had seen Him come to them over the 
surging billows, and then bid them be at peace. 
Peace! What peace to him now— in earth or 
heaven? It was the same Christ, but thorn- 
crowned, with nail-prints in His hands and feet. 
And this Judas had done to the Master ! Only 
for one moment did it seem to lie there ; then it 
was sucked up by the dark waters beneath. 
Again the cloud-curtain is drawn up ; the dark- 
ness is thicker, and the storm wilder than be- 
fore. Out into that darkness, with one wild 
plunge— there, where the figure of the dead 
Christ had lain on the waters ! And the dark 
waters have closed around him in eternal 
silence." Judas— the thief, the traitor, the sui- 
cide, the deicide. 

What an end to what a career ! Unparalleled 



Judas 1 5 

in the history of man, impossible, we think, of 
repetition. Is this so ? May there be no repeti- 
tion ? What then mean those words of scripture 
in which the sacred writer warns us of those who 
" crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh 
and put Him to an open shame " ? 

We think then of Judas as a monster of in- 
iquity, who committed a deed that can never be 
repeated. Is this true ? Are we so sure ? 

Consider the character of Judas, and see 
whether after all it is so different from what it is 
possible for any of us to become or to be. There t 
was nothing to distinguish Judas from the rest I 
of the disciples until the last deadly act of be- \ 
trayal was accomplished. Before that he was to 
all appearances the same as his companions. In 
fact from his position as the almoner and treas- 
urer of the little band, we might infer that in 
the eyes of the world he was a little superior to 
the rest of his associates. Doubtless Judas had 
a reputation as a financier, a reputation no doubt 
of value in the first as in the twentieth century. 
He was not easily moved to generous feeling by 



1 6 Judas 

any act of supreme devotion. When Mary of 
Bethany anointed the Saviour with that precious 
ointment costing about three hundred pence, Judas 
exclaims against this waste. He was indignant at 
this seemingly useless extravagance. No. To all 
outward appearances if you and I had met Judas 
before the betrayal, while he still possessed the 
confidence of his associates, we might have es- 
teemed him higher than some of his companions. 
He might have seemed to us less boorish, more 
businesslike, more a man of the world than the 
Galilean fishermen. If we had to make a choice 
from that band of disciples for some important 
position of trust, in which ability, sagacity, 
prudence, wisdom were required, we might have 
chosen him in preference to any of his fellow- 
disciples. 

Then, too, we may be sure that at first there 
must have been some germ of good in him, 
otherwise he would not have been willing to fol- 
low this new and unknown teacher of Nazareth. 
To be sure there was mixed up in this attach- 
ment and following some idea of self-advanc- 



Judas 1 7 

ment and- political preferment. But did not the 
other eleven also expect this ? Did they not all 
of them frequently dispute as to who should be 
greatest in the kingdom of heaven ? Had not 
the mother of James and John, the sons of 
Zebedee, solicited the highest station of honor for 
her sons ? Wherein was Judas more ambitious 
than the others ? If we regard Judas at his first 
following of Jesus he was not abnormal in char- 
acter at all. He does not seem to have been 
different from the eleven. We are too much in 
the habit of judging his character not at the be- 
ginning of his career, but at its end : not as he 
was when first he joined the Galilean prophet, but 
as the base traitor and betrayer of his Master and 
Friend. And so we think him a monster of in- 
iquity, an incarnate demon. In fact we are apt 
to consider all the apostles as somehow different 
from ourselves, and when they deny their Lord 
or betray Him we consider the crime enormous. 
We say to ourselves, " Had we been in their 
place we never would have been guilty as were 
Peter and Judas ; we would not have betrayed, 



1 8 Judas 

deserted, denied our Master in the hour of His 
loneliness and need." 

But crimes are committed only after deterio- 
ration of character, and deterioration is so gradual, 
often so unobserved, or if observed we excuse or 
justify our word or conduct, and before we know 
it, we are doing what we would have shuddered 
at, if any one had told us we should one day do 
it. Do you suppose if Judas had been told 
when first he joined Jesus of Nazareth that he 
would one day basely betray Him, that he would 
have believed it ? Nay. He would have repudi- 
ated the thought, he would have spurned the 
suggestion, he would have resented it as an in- 
sult. 

The treachery of betrayal is a most damning 
sin, and yet do you think that those who in his- 
tory stand out as the great traitors, whether to 
country or friend, do you think they originally 
believed betrayal on their part possible? Ask 
Themistocles at Salamis when he saved Greece 
from the Persian King Xerxes, whether it was pos- 
sible he would ever betray his country to Persia ? 



Judas 1 9 

Would he not have resented the imputation with 
indignation, and yet did not Themistocles even- 
tually betray his country ? Ask Benedict Arnold 
at Quebec or Saratoga, where he fought so 
valiantly for these colonies struggling for inde- 
pendence against the British crown, when his 
patriotism and loyalty were unquestioned and 
untainted, whether he would ever betray his 
country, and yet he stands to-day impeached be- 
fore the world as one of the most infamous of 
traitors. Were either of these men so abnormal 
in character at first? If they had any distin- 
guishing trait was it not the possession of un- 
common and extraordinary ability ? 

Brethren, there is nothing strange and nothing 
impossible in this world, and the conduct and 
career of Judas are practically repeated to-day 
by many and by all who have betrayed their 
Christian faith ; who having put their hand to 
the plough have turned back ; who dazzled by 
worldly advantages have given up the service of 
Christ; who because the world so persistently 
shouts that Christianity is a failure are discour- 



20 Judas 

aged and turn back from following Christ ; who 
as disciples of the Crucified would be " Christians 
without the cross." 

Knowing what you do of life, and looking it 
may be into your own experience, brethren, dare 
you say the infamous deed of Judas is unpar- 
alleled, that it can never be repeated ; or is it 
not true that his tragic deed and life find their 
counterpart in many a Christian life to-day; 
that the betrayer in all his enormity stands re- 
vealed as a witness not only of what we can 
become, but of what we may become ? His his- 
tory lives to warn us how discipleship is no 
safeguard against betrayal, how intimate com- 
munion does not debar disloyalty, how even 
tender affection is not proof against blackest 
treachery. How terrible the possibility, how 
tragic the probability ! 

Ah ! Brethren, as we read or hear read the 
words of the suffering Saviour who with bleeding 
heart, and aching voice comes into our life say- 
ing with bitterness of soul, " Verily I say unto 
you, that one of you shall betray Me," let us re- 



Judas 21 

member Judas and his awful and guilty career, 
then let us ask with serious and sad solemnity, 
and with deep searching of heart, " Lord, is 
it I?" 



II 

Peter 



II 



Jteter 

And the Lord turned and looked upon Peter. And Peter 
remembered the word of the Lord, how He had said unto him, 
Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny Me thrice. And Peter 
went out and wept bitterly Luke xxii : 6l, 62. 

WHEN we meditate upon the Passion of 
our Lord — the intensity of His agony, 
and the bitterness of the cross — we must surely 
realize that its anguish was deepened by the 
betrayal of one disciple, and the denial of an- 
other, that in the supreme moment of trial, 
Jesus was abandoned by His chosen disciples 
whom for three years he had been training by 
most intimate communion and private inter- 
course. How bitter, yea heartrending must it 
have been to have the great betrayal followed by 
the great denial. Judas betrays his Master with 
a kiss, and Peter denies Him with an oath. Can 
25 



26 Peter 

failure be more complete? Can discipleship be 
more ignominious ? 

Yet Peter was sure he would not deny his 
Lord. We remember how again and again 
when told by the Saviour that he would deny 
Him, Peter replies with vehemence that though 
he should die with his Master, yet would he 
never deny Him. And he meant it. His zeal 
and attachment in the past led Peter to believe 
he could and would do as he said. All his 
feelings had been aroused by the thought that 
one of them should betray his Lord. What a 
dastardly deed ! How base and treacherous ! 
Need we be surprised that the bare thought of 
such treachery aroused indignation in the 
apostle's breast, that it stirred up the heroic in 
his nature, kindled his zeal and courage, and 
urged him to give voice to his emotion, " though 
I should die with Thee, yet will I never deny 
Thee." 

Impulsive, warm hearted, forward, and enthu- 
siastic Peter gave little thought before he spoke. 
He seldom measured his speech, or guaged his 



Peter 27 

own capacity, but from the fulness of his heart 
he gave utterance to his feelings. Peter was 
intensely human. We can imagine how he 
must have hated baseness and treachery, how his 
whole soul must have revolted against the 
thought that any one of the twelve could be 
disloyal to his Master. In character Peter was 
practical rather than contemplative, eager for 
action, and disinclined to meditation. His 
energy was restive to find vent in expression. 
He was quick in decision, and also in execution, 
but his judgment was not always right. " He 
was easily misled by a rash self-confidence to 
say more and to venture more than he could ac- 
complish, and though he quickly and ardently 
seized on an object, he allowed himself too 
easily to relinquish it, by yielding to the force of 
another impression." This impulsiveness was 
manifested when, seeing the Saviour walking on 
the water, he asked if he might not do the same, 
and when bidden to come, and the waves began 
to rise, his fear overcame him, and he cried 
" Save, Lord, I perish ! " So again in that upper 



28 Peter 

room at the last supper, when the Master in 
wondrous humility girded Himself with a towel 
and took a basin and water to wash His dis- 
ciples' feet, it is Peter who says " Lord, dost 
Thou wash my feet ? . . . Thou shalt never 
wash my feet." But notice how quickly he 
recedes from this attitude when told, "If I 
wash thee not, thou hast no part with Me." 
Then Peter saith, " Lord, not my feet only, but 
also my hands and my head." As eager now 
for washing, as before in refusing. 

In this impulsiveness we see a tendency to 
rash boldness which when trial or temptation 
comes, shrinks and fails. When excess of feel- 
ing has been manifested without commensurate 
inward strength, then it is that the unexpected 
happens. Peter was certainly sincere in his 
strong asseverations of attachment. He honestly 
believed his own words when he professed that 
he was willing to die with his Master. But a 
crisis is often a revelation of weakness as well as 
of strength. It reveals at times phases of 
character that were never suspected. Misfortune 



Peter 29 

and danger often disclose tendencies and defects 
that never showed themselves when one was 
happy and prosperous. Such instances must 
have come into your experience. Some of your 
friends and acquaintances must have by their con- 
duct in critical situations surprised you, have per- 
haps utterly disappointed or deceived you, as well 
as at times confirmed your confidence in them. 

" Though I should die with Thee, yet will I 
never deny Thee." These are brave words, how 
are they justified ? Follow Peter into the court- 
yard of the high priest's palace. See him as he 
stands there warming himself by the fire of coals. 
He seems to be a stranger, and so one of the 
maids with critical eye examines him, and as she 
gazes suddenly she exclaims, "And thou also 
wast with Jesus of Nazareth." And what re- 
plies Peter ? He denied saying, " I know not, 
neither understand I what thou sayest." Mean- 
while his Master is but a short distance away 
falsely accused, powerless in the hands of His 
malignant enemies, — that Master for whom he 
had professed attachment unto death. Uneasy 



30 Peter 

man that he is because of his cowardice Peter 
moves out into the porch where he is less likely 
to be questioned, " and the cock crew." Omi- 
nous sound, does it not call to mind the 
Saviour's words : " Before the cock crow twice, 
thou shalt deny Me thrice." Alas ! Retreat 
seems impossible. For " a maid saw him again, 
and began to say to them that stood by — this is 
one of them, and he denied it again." And still 
his Master was on His trial, and already the in- 
sults to His person had begun. And a little 
after, i. e. t about an hour after, while Peter anx- 
ious to go, yet as a victim fascinated and fastened, 
moved about uneasy, and restless, " they that 
stood by said again to Peter, surely thou art one 
of them, for thou art a Galilean, and thy speech 
agreeth thereto. But he began to curse and to 
swear saying I know not this man of whom ye 
speak. And the second time the cock crew." 
Oh, what a base and dastardly denial. The 
shrill crow had scarcely ceased when Peter re- 
membered the words " before the cock crow 
twice, thou shalt deny Me thrice." Yet only a 



Peter 31 

few hours before he had declared his willingness 
to die with his Lord. How shamefully had he 
failed ; how wretchedly his boasted courage had 
vanished. Could he but get away, away from 
this scene of denial and blasphemy. And just at 
this moment while yet the oath had scarcely 
died from his lips, the oath uttered with such 
vehemence that probably it reached even to his 
Master's ears, the recreant disciple looked up, 
and as he looked up " the Lord turned and 
looked upon Peter " ; yes, just at that moment in 
the midst of his own trial, of his shameful and 
brutal treatment, the Lord turned round and 
looked upon him — yes in all that assembly — 
upon Peter — " a glance full we must believe of 
tenderest pity, and deepest sadness as of one 
who was moved not by anger but by sorrow." 
" His eyes spake His words, nay much more, 
they searched down to the innermost depths of 
Peter's heart, and broke them open. They had 
pierced through all self-delusion, false shame, and 
fear ; they had reached the man, the disciple, the 
lover of Jesus. Forth they burst, the waters of 



32 Peter 

conviction, of true shame, of heart sorrow, of the 
agonies of self-condemnation." Out into the 
night he rushed, out from that scene of denial 
and shameful blasphemy, out into the darkness, 
weeping bitterly. Could he ever forget that 
look, so pitiful, so reproachful, so sorrowful ! 
That look must have burnt itself into his heart 
and soul, never more to be the same, never more 
to be free from that compassionate gaze. 

" The Saviour looked on Peter. Ay, no word — 
No gesture of reproach ! The heavens serene 
Though heavy with armed justice, did not lean 
Their thunders that way. The forsaken Lord 
Looked only, on the traitor. None record 
What that look was ; none guess ; for those who have 

seen 
Wronged lovers loving through a death pang keen, 
Or pale-cheeked martyrs smiling to a sword, 
Have missed Jehovah at the judgment-call, 
And Peter from the height of blasphemy — 
' I never knew this man ' did quail and fall, 
As knowing straight that God, — and turned free 
And went out speechless from the face of all, 
And filled the silence weeping bitterly. 

" I think that look of Christ might seem to say — 
« Thou Peter ! art thou then a common stone 
Which I at last must break My heart upon, 
For all God's charge to His high angels may 



Peter 33 

Guard My foot better ? Did I yesterday- 
Wash thy feet, My beloved, that they should run 
Quick to deny Me 'neath the morning sun ? 
And do thy kisses, like the rest, betray ? 
The cock crows coldly. — Go, and manifest 
A late contrition, but no bootless fear ! 
For when thy final need is dreariest, 
Thou shalt not be denied, as I am here. 
My voice, to God and angels, shall attest, 
Because I KNOW this man, let him be clear.' " 

How shall we account for Peter's conduct? 
Had his character completely changed, or is it, 
that not until now have certain defects been 
brought to light, become prominent in being 
tried and tested. Character is not made or un- 
made by a single act, though it may reveal itself 
in some supreme act. How then shall we ex- 
plain Peter's denial? It can only be done by 
showing that there were certain radically weak 
elements of character that now had a chance to 
show themselves. 

First we know that Peter had always shown 
confidence in himself. He had displayed self- 
assurance, there was a certain strain of vainglory 
and boastfulness in his nature. But his self-reli- 



34 Peter 

ance and confidence had not taken into account 
a set of circumstances in which moral courage 
would be needed even more than physical cour- 
age. It was here that Peter failed. Moral courage 
was weak in him. Even in later years at Antioch 
he fell because of this same lack of moral cour- 
age, when having lived with Gentiles as a Gentile, 
he withdrew from association with them upon 
being charged with it by certain Jews. In the 
apostle's nature there was a wish to be well 
thought of by men. He desired popularity. 
When approved by general sentiment, he could 
display great courage and leadership, but if he 
was on what might be considered the unpopular, 
the weaker, or losing side, then his courage 
failed. 

Closely connected with lack of moral courage 
is the sense of shame. Peter was now doubtless 
ashamed to be connected with a man who was a 
prisoner, whose claims were repudiated ; with a 
cause that now seemed to be declining, despised, 
ridiculed. How could he acknowledge himself a 
disciple of that lone Man standing helpless and 



Peter 35 

friendless before the high priest and Sanhedrin, 
— that lonely Man already betrayed by one of His 
disciples, and abandoned by the others, — and now 
as He stood before the rulers was insulted, buf- 
feted, and spit upon by the malicious and cruel 
servants. To ally ourselves with what is de- 
spised, contemptuous ! No ! We must by all 
means avoid this ! Ridicule, contempt, and fear 
of what the world will think have overthrown 
more disciples of Christ than force or threats. 

Then, again, Peter might have asked himself, 
" What good will it do me to acknowledge al- 
legiance now ? Everything points to its useless- 
ness. All the hopes I had of the restoration of 
the kingdom to Israel are shattered. Jesus, my 
Master, He who filled me with these vain hopes 
— is now seized and already condemned. What 
can I do to help Him — I alone ! Why don't the 
others stand by Him ? If the other ten would, 
then I would. But why should the test of loy- 
alty be laid wholly upon me ? I am no more re- 
sponsible for allegiance than they are. If they 
have deserted, I have the right to deny. I can 



36 Peter 

do no good alone." Furthermore he might have 
said, " What right have I to be questioned or be 
asked? These servants, these women have no 
right to inquire into my affairs, my beliefs, my 
religious attachments. It is none of their busi- 
ness. I have a perfect right to refuse to tell them 
the truth ; they are not entitled to it. Confes- 
sion will not help my Master, and it will ruin 
me." And so in the face of the strong, and seem- 
ingly irresistible opposition ; influenced also by 
plausible self-reasoning, he gives way, he makes 
up his mind he will not confess. He denies his 
Lord, and at last he denies Him with an oath. 

Then, too, we may believe that there was also 
some fear for his own safety and life. We may 
be ever so brave, yet the instinct of self-preserva- 
tion may often in a crisis, or unexpected emer- 
gency rob us of reason and honor, make us most 
cowardly, strip us of our courage, make us do 
anything to save ourselves. What will not peo- 
ple do in a panic, when a theatre is on fire, or 
when a vessel is sinking in mid ocean ? Indeed 
we seldom know what we would do, how we 



Peter 37 

would act when we stand face to face with immi- 
nent death. Strength of attachment fails at times 
to rise above the stronger force of fear. It was 
such a crisis that confronted Peter. His life 
seemed to be at stake. How easy to save it with 
a lie and oath that could neither save nor hurt 
his Master. And just then the cock crew, and 
the Lord turned and looked on Peter. 

What memories it awoke, what shame it 
aroused. Whether true or not, there is a tradi- 
tion that for nearly forty years even until Peter 
was himself crucified as his Lord, the remem- 
brance of this night of denial never left the apostle, 
but that in penitence, " morning by morning he 
rose at the hour when the look of his Master en- 
tered into his soul, to pray once more for 
pardon." 

This pardon we know was granted. The base 
denial was pardoned by full restoration. It was 
by the lake-side where Peter's untroubled life 
had been spent, ere yet the eventful call came, 
" Follow Me." Yes, it was by that lake-side, 
after the shameful crucifixion, after the glorious 



38 Peter 

resurrection that the Saviour appeared to seven 
of His disciples, among them Peter. They had 
been fishing all night and caught nothing, and 
now at daybreak a form appears on the shore, a 
voice is heard, and the stranger after learning of 
their ill-success says, " Cast the net on the right 
side of the ship and ye shall find." And once 
again as in the days of their early discipleship 
the net is filled to breaking. It is no stranger 
that has spoken, it is the Lord. When they 
come to land they see a fire of coals and fish laid 
thereon and bread. They are invited to dine. 
After dining — still seated by the fire of coals, a 
fire which for Peter could only evoke sad remi- 
niscence, and arouse deep feelings of shame and 
penitence — for it was by such a fire of coals 
only a few weeks before that he had denied his 
Lord, — the Saviour, with thrice repeated ques- 
tion to correspond to the threefold denial asks 
Peter, " Simon, son of Jonah, lovest thou Me ? " 
" Peter understood it all. No longer with confi- 
dence in self, and avoiding the former reference 
to others he replied appealing rather to his 



Peter 39 

Lord's than to his own consciousness, <Yea! 
Lord, Thou knowest that I love Thee.' . . . 
Yes, Peter did love the Lord Jesus. He had 
loved Him when he said it only too confident in 
the strength of his feelings that he would follow 
his Master even unto death. Jesus saw it all, 
yea, and how the love of the ardent tempera- 
ment which had once made him rove at wild 
liberty, would give place to patient work of love 
and be crowned with martyrdom." The denial 
of the past was forgiven, and genuine peni- 
tence was shown by a life of devotion even 
unto death. 

If tradition may be trusted the end came at 
Rome during the Neronian persecution. At the 
urgent request of the Christians there, the apostle 
was prevailed upon to flee the city for his safety. 
At night he leaves, but ere he had reached the 
city gates he sees — strange sight — his Lord com- 
ing to meet him. The apostle impulsively, as of 
old, questions, " Domine, quo vadis ? Lord, 
whither goest Thou ? " to which the Lord replies, 
" I go to be crucified again." The apostle rec- 



40 Peter 

ognizes the rebuke, and turns back into the city 
to endure the crucifixion he would escape. 

And are there no Peters to-day; no denials 
like his ? Have we none of us done as he did ? 
Denied our Lord by being ashamed of Him ; 
ashamed of our religion ; held back from ac- 
knowledging Him ; kept silent when our religion 
was attacked or ridiculed, and our Master put on 
His trial once again by the mocking of skeptics, 
disbelievers, revilers ? Do we not at times when 
in certain company or places ask, what use to 
confess discipleship, i. e., act, speak, live as a 
Christian ? To do so will subject us to ridicule, 
scorn, contempt, perhaps loss of position, or of 
advantages, or of some prize — social or financial. 
To confess will not do Christ any good ; it will 
injure us. Yes we say, " It is better not to con- 
fess, for then we shall not cause ridicule to be 
brought upon our religion, and our Christ." We 
try to deceive ourselves that we really have the 
cause of Christ at heart, and perhaps in justifica- 
tion of our silence repeat the Saviour's words, 
" Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, 



Peter 41 

neither cast ye your pearls before swine." We 
say — " this is a time to keep silent. Do as the 
rest. Aye, when challenged — deny." Do you 
not then hear the cock crow? Oh man, oh 
woman, is it not the same denial as of old? 
Was the apostle so very dastardly after all ? Do 
we say his conduct was unpardonable ? Do we 
think we would not have acted as he acted ? Let 
us cast our minds over our own lives, and notice 
the times we have been ashamed of our religious 
convictions, been ashamed to pray, to worship 
God, to acknowledge Him whether at home, or 
in some public place, and will it be only thrice 
that we have thus denied our Lord, or will it not 
be more frequently than we can count ? 

Happy indeed if in our denial the Lord in 
mercy and love turn and look upon us with His 
pitying and forgiving eye, and bring us back to 
penitence and fidelity. 

Disciples of Jesus of Nazareth ! — do you never 
hear the cock crow in your lives ? 



Ill 

Caiaphas 



Ill 

(Haiapljaa 

And one of them named Caiaphas being the high priest that 
same year said unto them, Ye know nothing at all, nor con- 
sider that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for the 
people, and that the whole nation perish not. — John xi : 49, 50. 

SO spake the High Priest Caiaphas, — bold, 
unscrupulous, clear-sighted and ambitious 
— in that preliminary council which planned 
definitely to apprehend Jesus. This council met 
soon after Lazarus had been raised from the dead 
— a notable miracle which could not be concealed, 
and none deny. The fame of it spread through- 
out all Judaea, and in consequence of it many 
of the Jews believed. The question the 
ecclesiastical rulers now found themselves con- 
fronted with was, what were they to do in regard 
to the claims of this teacher of Nazareth ? The 
people would naturally look to see what attitude 
45 



46 Caiaplias 

their religious leaders, teachers, and rulers — the 
high priest, the Sanhedrin, the scribes, and 
elders — would take. They were versed in the 
law ; they understood the prophesies ; they were 
the natural persons to direct religious teaching, 
and to formulate doctrinal beliefs. To these rep- 
resentatives of religion the people instinctively 
looked for guidance. If not to them, to whom 
should they or could they turn ? Still more the 
high priest and Sanhedrin embodied what little 
semblance and remnant of authority the Romans 
had left to the Jews. 

The office therefore of the high priest gather- 
ing in his person as he did both ecclesiastical and 
political supremacy for the nation and people was 
of extreme importance and of paramount influ- 
ence. To interfere with this supremacy came 
the teaching, the works, the claims of one Jesus 
of Nazareth; His teaching so wonderful that 
"the common people heard Him gladly," and 
crowded to listen ; His teaching so imperative, 
" for He taught as one having authority and not 
as the scribes " ; His teaching so unique, " for 



Caiaphas 47 

never man spake like this man " ; His teaching 
so human and compassionate, " for the Son of 
Man is come to seek and to save that which is 
lost " ; His teaching so loving and forgiving seen 
in numberless instances when the heart-broken 
sinner departed, comforted by the words " thy 
sins be forgiven thee ; go thy way, thy faith hath 
saved thee " ; this teaching had compelled and 
drawn multitudes to follow the new teacher. 

Then, too, His miracles had attracted many. 
It is perhaps impossible for us to realize what a 
religious sensation and revolution the teaching 
and miracles of Jesus caused. All Palestine 
must have been stirred to its remotest villages. 
Hundreds and thousands of families throughout 
the land must have discussed the merits and the 
claims of this new prophet. Not only Galilee, 
but Judaea and Jerusalem, must have been filled 
with rumors and reports of His gracious words 
and deeds. It is impossible for us to conceive 
the religious excitement and emotion — and our 
generation has not been without some religious 
sensations and claims — the strange longing and 



48 Caiaphas 



yearning which this Galilean Rabbi aroused. 
What hopes and expectations must have been 
excited; what national ambitions might be 
achieved. Ah ! what balm for the hungry and 
wounded soul and heart might He not fur- 
nish. 

And, then, to crown all, think of that un- 
paralleled triumphal entry into Jerusalem a few 
days before the Passover, when almost a whole 
city went out to meet Him as He came from 
Bethany to Jerusalem, when in rapture of joy 
and enthusiasm the multitudes cut down branches 
and spread them in the way, and even took off 
their outer garments and strewed them in the 
way, and with palm branches in their hands 
hailed Him with cries, " Hozanna to the Son of 
David ; blessed is He that cometh in the name 
of the Lord, Hozanna in the highest." Can we 
realize the intense excitement this triumphal 
entry aroused, and wonder that the city was 
moved to exclaim, " Who is this ? " Can we 
not readily credit the confession of helplessness 
of the Pharisees, " Perceive ye how ye prevail 



Caiaphas 49 



nothing ? Behold the world is gone after Him " ? 
or again their appeal to Jesus to repress the 
triumphal cries, and His reply, " I tell you that 
if these should hold their peace the stones would 
immediately cry out." 

It was evident that the relation of the high 
priest and elders to the people was in danger. 
The growing influence of Jesus with the people 
threatened their power ; if they did not watch 
and counteract this influence, their authority and 
supremacy soon would be a thing of the past. 
The unquestioned power which they had exer- 
cised, and the implicit obedience which the peo- 
ple had rendered were both at stake. Do we 
wonder that they were unwilling to surrender 
their influence, power, authority, supremacy? Do 
we wonder at the jealousy, envy, yes malignant 
hate which would be aroused in the hearts of 
the ecclesiastical rulers as they noticed the un- 
bounded and growing popularity of this young 
and unaccredited teacher — a teacher without 
family connections, without academic antece- 
dents; a teacher who in many instances had 



50 Caiaphas 



shown his superiority to their traditions, and had 
exposed with merciless sarcasms their hypocri- 
sies ; a teacher who only a few days before in 
righteous anger had cleansed the Temple pre- 
cincts of those who sold doves, and had over- 
thrown the tables of the money changers, yes 
had cleansed the Temple courts of huckstering 
and bartering, and yet no one at the time had 
dared to interfere, or been bold enough to resist. 
Surely this was a critical time for the ecclesias- 
tical rulers. If the popular feeling for the Gali- 
lean prophet grew then the influence and 
authority of the high priest were doomed. 

We can readily imagine that Caiaphas, the 
high priest and his family, were not going to 
yield without a struggle. They determined to 
end the career of this unauthorized teacher, this 
unconscious rival of theirs. 

But how ? Is there not a proverb that every 
man has his price ? The high priest and rulers 
had not lived and intrigued as long as they had 
without knowing that the loyalty of many a 
friend, and the allegiance of many a disciple can 



Caiaphas 5 1 



be tampered with. Whether Judas first came to 
them, or they first made overtures to Judas the 
plot between them was settled. The rulers had 
seduced for a paltry thirty pieces of silver one 
of the inner circle of disciples. He would ar- 
range to betray his Master. It would be at 
night when there would be no danger from the 
people rising in his defense, — at night when his 
Master might best be taken unawares. How 
greedily these religious rulers fell in with the 
plan. How determined they were that, when 
they moved, they would move swiftly and 
surely, would end the pretensions of their rival, 
would turn the popular tide, would regain 
their fast waning influence and authority. 

I need not recite again the tragedy of the 
Garden, the crime of eternity. Humanly 
speaking the plot succeeded perfectly. The 
small band of disciples — what could it do against 
the great company armed with swords and 
staves ? Before this show of force the disciples 
fled ignominiously. Triumphantly the prisoner 
is led away to the high priest's palace. And 



5 2 Caiaplias 



there, though one disciple had recovered suf- 
ficient courage to follow, yet when confronted 
with the fact of discipleship he shamefully denies 
his Lord. And alone before His enemies stands 
Jesus of Nazareth — before Caiaphas, envious, 
jealous, worldly, — before rulers determined upon 
His death. 

Let us consider, then, the reasons for this de- 
termination to put Jesus to death, this fierce ve- 
hemence of Caiaphas and the rulers to justify 
their condemnation. The cause is found in one 
of the blackest and most deadly of sins — envy — 
a sin so easily nursed, so silent, so unseen, and 
yet so malicious and malignant that it seems to 
spring from the deepest depths of the heart of 
Satan himself, — a sin that like a hot blasting 
storm wastes the heart, and dries up all affection, 
all pity. If any sin can be — it, envy, is perhaps 
the unpardonable sin. God keep and preserve 
us from its grasp ! Is it a wonder that Jesus 
continually facing this spirit of envy lays in His 
Gospel so much stress on humility ? 

When, therefore, the religious success of Jesus 



Caiaphas 5 3 



aroused the nation, the rulers — Caiaphas and the 
elders — were moved with envy. They saw the 
threatened overthrow of their religious and 
political importance if this religious revival con- 
tinued ; hence their envy which manifested itself 
in two directions, viz. : in {a) religious intoler- 
ance, and {b) promptings of worldly interest. 

(a) It seems like a libel to say or think that 
religious teachers could be envious of each other, 
and become intolerant, yet envy cloaked itself 
under religious guise, and religious intolerance 
sheltered itself under a profession of attachment 
to truth and tradition. It is noticeable, as a rule, 
that there is little religious intolerance when one 
side is very strong and the other very weak, so 
that nothing is to be feared from the latter, but 
instead a feeling of contempt or indifference pre- 
vails. But just so soon as the weak becomes 
strong, then envy finds expression in religious 
intolerance. We see this animus in the case of 
Caiaphas and the rulers. Now that this teacher 
of Nazareth had become popular, and now that 
His following had grown to such proportions, they 



54 Caiaphas 



both became threatening and must be stamped 
out at any cost. 

Notice then how this envy showed itself in re- 
ligious intolerance. First in treachery. The 
rulers seduced a disciple to betray for a paltry 
sum his Master. This for the reputed sake of re- 
ligion, or rather religious domination. Do we 
wonder that at times religion is scorned and re- 
jected ? And again because intolerance is cow- 
ardly it dare not arrest Jesus in the daytime, 
but treacherously seizes Him in the dark almost 
at midnight. 

Next religious intolerance led to deceit. The 
false witnesses and their false evidence would 
make one who was seeking the truth burn with 
indignation at the evident perjury. The Evan- 
gelists tell us how absolutely irrelevant was the 
testimony against the prisoner, how it broke 
down completely, and how, contrary to legal pre- 
cedents, the judge tried to make the prisoner in- 
criminate himself. 

Again religious intolerance led to injustice in 
not affording the prisoner a chance to defend 



Caiaphas 5 5 



Himself. He was given no council, no witnesses. 
The evident purpose of the court was to convict, 
not to find out the truth, — a proceeding not un- 
known even in modern courts — when prosecuting 
attorneys become persecuting attorneys, and 
seem bent on proving the accused at the bar 
guilty, and do not limit their efforts simply to as- 
certain the exact truth in the case by giving the 
prisoner impartial examination. Prosecution 
then becomes persecution ; and perhaps no per- 
secution is ever so vindictive and cruel as re- 
ligious persecution. The record of trials for 
heresy, ancient and modern, testify to the malig- 
nant injustice of prosecutors. Thus the trial of 
Jesus became a mockery of justice, and in gross 
violation of all law the prisoner was adjudged 
worthy of death. Then vindictiveness and mal- 
ice vented themselves on that innocent person in 
cowardly and cruel treatment. And remember 
the coward is always cruel. What could be more 
cruel than the treatment of the cowardly servi- 
tors of the high priest, who after the condemna- 
tion of Jesus " began to spit on Him, and to 



56 Caiaphas 



cover His face, and to buffet Him, and to say unto 
Him, Prophesy ! and the servants did strike Him 
with the palms of their hands ; " meanwhile the 
high priest and elders did nothing to stop this 
wanton and cowardly treatment. 

{b) But if envy could through religious in- 
tolerance countenance such unjust and inhuman 
treatment, it also manifested itself in promptings 
of worldly interest. For underlying all action 
of Caiaphas and the rulers was envy of the in- 
creasing favor of Jesus of Nazareth with the peo- 
ple, and the consequent loss of social and po- 
litical prestige. In the trial when some justifica- 
tion was needed for condemning Jesus, religious 
scruples were advanced. He was accused of 
blasphemy ; but earlier when the plot to arrest 
Jesus was determined upon, Caiaphas was plain 
enough. In the words of our text he enunciated 
" what seemed to him the political necessity for 
the judicial murder of Christ ; there was no pre- 
tense on his part of religious motives or zeal for 
God. . . . What was the use of discussing 
about forms of law or about the man ? . . . 



Caiaphas 57 



He spoke as the bold, unscrupulous, determined 
man that he was." Worldly interest was at 
stake, political prestige was endangered. It was 
folly for the elders to stand upon a few techni- 
calities of law, if they were to maintain their 
preeminence and their supremacy. With bold 
arrogance Caiaphas swept aside all legal ob- 
stacles. He placed before the council the alter- 
natives of the maintenance of their own interests 
by the death of Jesus ; or else the loss of their 
power if He should be allowed to live. What 
could envy answer when confronted by such 
alternatives? Would it not readily and un- 
scrupulously use its influence and force to over- 
throw and conquer its rival ? Caiaphas knew the 
strength of the motive to which he appealed. 
He was clear-sighted, keen in matters of self-in- 
terest, arrogant in disregarding the claims and 
rights of any who might cross his path. The 
result was not uncertain. The death of Jesus 
was determined and consummated. And yet 
Caiaphas was a religious leader and teacher. 
Is it possible, we ask, that the act of Caiaphas 



5 8 Caiaphas 



should ever be repeated ? The answer is found 
in the question has envy ceased to exist since his 
days ? Have not religious intolerance and envy 
been marked stains of the Christian Church, 
spoiling its beauty, blemishing its holiness, des- 
troying its unity, corrupting its truth ? Do we 
not to-day see religious intolerance manifested in 
scorn and ridicule of others who may be doing 
good in their way which may not be in our way 
— whether these be found in our own or in other 
communions ? Has not envy of the work and 
success of others often called forth criticism and 
condemnation ? Has not divine grace been 
denied it though the fruits of the Spirit are 
abundantly manifested ? Is not such work often 
called the work of Beelzebub — thus repeating 
again that awful spirit of Caiaphas and the relig- 
ious rulers who in envy attributed the works of 
Jesus to the power of Beelzebub ? 

And then when Christians have become im- 
bued with the worldly spirit have they not been 
only too ready to use the power of the state to 
crush those in opposition ? No more disastrous 



Caiaphas 59 



alliance for religion pure and undefiled was ever 
made than that of Church and State. No alli- 
ance has done more to corrupt the Christian 
Church than the conferring of temporal dignities 
and powers upon religious leaders as was done in 
Europe after the conversion of Constantine. It 
was envy allied with worldly interests that made 
it possible for the Arians to persecute Athana- 
sius, drive him from his see of Alexandria, and 
cause him to wander as an exile for many 
years. It was this same lust of temporal power 
and envy that made it possible for Christians to 
persecute Christians in the Middle Ages, to per- 
petrate the horrors of the Inquisition, the fires of 
Smithfield, and the massacre of St. Bartholo- 
mew's Day. It was this same spirit of envy 
which made the established Church of England 
persecute in England the Puritans, compelling 
them to flee to this New World where they 
might exercise freedom of conscience, and enjoy 
liberty of worship ; and in turn made these same 
persecuted Puritans when dominant here, perse- 
cute the feeble and unprotected Churchmen of 



60 Caiaphas 

this New World. It is the same spirit which to- 
day may animate one communion to decry or 
ridicule another, to watch one another with jeal- 
ous and criticizing eye, to find flaws in each 
other's doctrine, or conduct or worship, to find 
motives for disparaging what may seem to be 
marks of grace, to withhold the hand of fellow- 
ship or of kindness, to refuse the word of sym- 
pathy and encouragement, to fail to rejoice in the 
successes and victories over evil crime or heath- 
enism of those outside our own ecclesiastical 
fences. 

As I read the history of the Christian Church 
and note its rent fragments and schisms, I think 
I see the satanic spirit of envy responsible for 
much of our unhappy divisions and strifes, for 
our unbrotherly recriminations, for our lack of 
unity and truth. I see this spirit of envy re- 
sponsible for much of the undoing of the Chris- 
tian faith, for much of its weakness, its lack of 
growth, and its failure to mould and shape, to 
control and elevate, to inspire and transfigure the 
lives of the men and women of our time. 



Caiaphas 61 

Ah ! the spirit of Caiaphas and of the rulers — 
the spirit of envy is not dead to-day. It is 
gnawing at the very heart of Christendom. It is 
the spirit which says if the cause of Christ can- 
not be advanced in our way, but may in an- 
other's way, then better it should not advance 
at all. 

Rule or ruin is the axiom of envy, casting 
stones and stumbling blocks its practice. 

It was envy which slew and crucified the in- 
nocent Christ nineteen hundred years ago ; it is 
envy which to-day is rending, yes, crucifying 
afresh His body the Church. 

Well may we Christians in shame and peni- 
tence pray, " From envy, hatred, malice, and all 
uncharitableness, Good Lord deliver us." 



IV 

Pontius Pilate 



IV 
JponttUB plate 

When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing, but that 
rather a tumult was made, he took water, and washed his 
hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent of the blood 
of this just person ; see ye to it. — Matthew xxvii : 24. 

JUDAS ISCARIOT and Pontius Pilate— dare 
we say twin wandering stars in the moral 
heavens of human history " to whom is reserved 
the blackness of darkness forever." The one 
betrayed, the other crucified Jesus of Nazareth. 
One initiated, the other concluded the world's 
great crime of injustice and judicial murder. 
What sadder names of what sadder characters can 
be found to surpass the infamy of these names 
in Christian history ! What representatives of 
moral tragedy, what types of moral failure ! 
Who has not heard the name Judas, and the 
name Pilate? The Jew and the Roman, the 
East and the West linked and united in the per- 
65 



66 Pontius Pilate 



petration of the crime of humanity. What 
more convincing evidence do we need of the 
unity of man in sin and condemnation, what 
clearer witness of the common need of a uni- 
versal Saviour. 

As we study the life of Pontius Pilate, we 
wonder at times whether he could have done 
what he did while in a state of momentary 
weakness, whether the proud Roman strength, 
and the respect for justice did not suffer a 
temporary eclipse. But we have only to go to 
profane writers to find out that Pilate's con- 
demnation of Christ is foreshadowed in his 
earlier conduct and intercourse with the Jews. 
His administration previous to our Lord's trial 
had been one long contest between Roman 
insolence and Jewish fanaticism, between Roman 
irreligiousness and Jewish religious scrupulosity. 
One of Pilate's first acts on becoming procurator 
of Judaea was to move the headquarters of his 
army from Caesarea, the former residence of the 
Roman governor, to Jerusalem, and to bring 
with him into the Holy City the idolatrous 



Pontius Pilate 6y 



standards of heathen Rome. This outrage of 
Jewish religious scruples aroused the people to 
frenzy. They hurried in crowds to Caesarea to 
implore the removal of these standards, and only 
after five days of sullen obstinacy on the part of 
the governor, and ill-treatment of the Jews at 
the hands of his soldiers did Pilate at length 
yield to the frenzied mob. 

Then, too, he had taken the Corban — the 
sacred money of the Temple treasury — and had 
put it to the profane use of constructing an 
aqueduct. This mal-use of the sacred money led 
to another tumult which was suppressed by the 
massacre not only of rioters, but also innocent 
spectators. And once more from Scripture we 
know that on one occasion he slew some 
Galileans in the Temple while they were wor- 
shiping, and mingled their blood with the blood 
of the sacrifices. 

Pilate's rule had been troubled from the be- 
ginning. He hated the Jewish fanaticism, while 
the Jews hated his insolent imperiousness. He 
continually quarreled with them, and freely shed 



68 Pontius Pilate 



their blood, while they in turn accused him of 
corruption, cruelty, and maladministration. 

One has thus ventured to describe Pilate — • 
" His aspect is cold and dark. His countenance 
is bloodless, his eyes restless, near together, and 
set deep beneath his brows. The features are 
very fixed and more as if they were made of 
stone than of flesh. He neither smiles, nor 
gives evidence on the surface of any emotion 
either agreeable or painful . . . except that 
at times a shadow so deep . . . lends to 
his face the darkness and terrors of night and 
death. A selfish rapacity, and a heartless dis- 
regard of the rights and lives of those who 
come within his power have made him to be 
noted not only here in the east, but at Rome 
also. He is a person into whose hands one 
would unwillingly fall, who would not perhaps 
injure or slay so much from feelings of wanton 
cruelty as from a cold indifference to the life of 
another ; just as there are those who will not, 
truly, go out of their way to crush an insect, but 
will not turn aside the breadth of a hair, if one 



Pontius Pilate 69 



should perchance lie in their path ; and those 
who, if through some error, they have been the 
cause of innocent lives being destroyed, will 
enjoy none the less their next hour's rest, or 
their next cup of wine." It was before such a 
man with this antecedent history and character 
that Jesus of Nazareth is brought for trial. Can 
much be hoped for from Pilate ; can we expect 
much mercy from one who despised the religious 
fanaticism of the Jews ? Dare Jesus hope for 
acquittal ? 

It is the time of the Passover. Pilate accord- 
ing to his wont has come from Csesarea up to 
Jerusalem, to be near at hand in case any riot 
should arise from religious frenzy. There seem 
to be indications of some excitement in the 
rapturous greeting of the Galilean prophet, 
Jesus of Nazareth. The city had gone into 
ecstasies on His entrance. He will bear watch- 
ing. And now just before the Passover, the 
chief priests early in the morning bring before 
the governor this very Jesus of Nazareth bound 
as a prisoner, and charge Him with being a male- 



70 Pontius Pilate 



factor. The specific accusations at the first were, 
He was perverting the nation — this was a charge 
of conspiracy ; He was forbidding to pay 
tribute to Csesar — this was revolution ; He was 
claiming to be a king Himself — this was treason. 
Serious charges, were they true. The Roman 
governor had been resident long enough in 
Judaea to know that such charges if true instead 
of being a cause for accusation or surrender on 
the part of his countrymen would be an occasion 
of rejoicing to a people who resented bitterly 
the burden of the Roman yoke, who hated their 
imperial masters, and were only too ready to rise 
in revolt against them, and to assist any one who 
offered to lead them to victory and independence. 
No ! No ! Pilate realized that Jews did not 
have such tender respect for Roman rule as to be 
willing to accuse one of their own countrymen 
for raising the standard of revolt. The charges 
were evidently a cover to conceal some deeper 
design. He knew that the popularity and even 
the authority of the Jewish hierarchy had been 
threatened by the growing influence of this 



Pontius Pilate yi 



Galilean prophet. He cared, however, little for 
their religious rivalries and feuds. He knew that 
for envy the chief priests had accused Jesus. 
He was fully conscious of the innocence of the 
prisoner before him, whose calm bearing, whose 
mild countenance contrasted strangely with the 
malevolent and vindictive vehemence of his 
accusers. A very brief examination of the 
prisoner confirms Pilate's intuitions, and he 
openly tells the chief priests, " I find in Him no 
fault at all," and he endeavors to set Jesus free. 
Three different times in the course of the trial, 
Pilate distinctly asserts the innocence of Jesus : 
three times he declares, " I find in Him no fault 
at all." Yet with this firm conviction, and 
reiterated declaration of the innocence of the 
prisoner, why does the governor hesitate to act 
upon his convictions, how is it that eventually 
he fails to acquit, and to release Jesus ? 

We ask, why was it that Pilate, the governor 
and judge, appointed to dispense justice, failed 
so wretchedly in doing his duty? Stern, un- 
bending Roman, haughty and insolent to these 



72 Pontius Pilate 



provincials, what were the causes of Pilate's 
failure, and utter shipwreck of life ? 

Into every life there comes some time — and 
often we are unconscious of it — the supreme 
trial of our character and life— the crisis of our 
spiritual history. It is the fatal moment when is 
poised in the balances our future destiny, and our 
faithfulness or unfaithfulness in this instance 
determines for good or evil, for honor or dis- 
honor, for success or failure our whole after life. 
The event may come into our experience just as 
one of the many ordinary incidents of our life. 
There is nothing strange or unusual about the 
event : it may be the repetition of some past ex- 
perience : it is something we are accustomed to. 
Thus Pilate had often sat in the judgment seat. 
It was no new thing for him to try cases. When, 
therefore, Jesus stood before him to be tried, it 
was no new experience, it was nothing extra- 
ordinary in the governor's life. And yet 
natural as was the event, it was the critical 
moment of Pilate's life ; it was the supreme test 
of his character, and in the test he failed. 



Pontius Pilate 73 



The reasons for this failure are not difficult to 
find. In spite of his sternness Pilate was a weak, 
irresolute man because he was selfish, self-seeking, 
untrue and unfaithful. 

Consider his selfishness. His life was con- 
trolled by thoughts of personal advancement. 
He was what we would call to-day an opportunist. 
He had his ear close to the ground listening for 
the rumblings of coming events, and trying to 
forecast the way imperial or popular whim and 
caprice might turn. He was governed by shifting 
circumstances, not by eternal principles. Though 
convinced of the innocence of the prisoner, and 
anxious to release Him, yet when the multi- 
tude shouted, " If thou let this man go, thou art 
not Caesar's friend," the fear of imperial displeasure 
swept away every instinct of mercy, and con- 
sideration of justice; the dread of loss of power 
and station made him yield himself a tool to in- 
justice and crime. " Circumstances it is often 
said mould men ; but it often depends upon a 
man himself after what fashion these circum- 
stances shall mould him " : whether he shall be 



74 Pontius Pilate 



their master or their servant. But the oppor- 
tunist never plays the hero. The hour comes, 
and the opportunity comes, but he who depends 
on popular favor never can rise to the oppor- 
tunity or control the circumstances. What a 
moment for Pilate ! What a moment in the 
world's spiritual history, what tremendous conse- 
quences hung in the balance ! " One expression 
of an honest and bold determination to take on 
himself a responsibility from which no Roman 
magistrate ought ever to have shrunk," would 
have freed the prisoner, and freed himself. But 
Pilate was not equal to the emergency. He 
hesitated, and in that instant his courage and his 
resolution were swept away in the wild, mad 
rage of the mob's outcry. 

But this surrender would have been impossible 
had there not been a more serious defect of 
character. Pilate lacked the primary convictions 
of truth and righteousness ; he manifested a total 
want of principles — the elemental root of failure 
was his moral weakness which led him to pervert 
justice and to disregard right. Failing to pos- 



Pontius Pilate 75 



sess any convictions of truth, lacking the princi- 
ple of righteousness to control life, we can easily 
account for his wretched vacillation, his base 
surrender, and his miserable theatrical self-de- 
ception in the melodramatic ablutions of his 
hands. Conscious of the fact that Jesus was 
innocent of the charges brought against Him, it 
was the duty of Pilate as judge to acquit the 
prisoner, no matter who the prosecutors, no 
matter how eminent in rank. But he vacillated. 
He dared to argue, to dally with a self-evident 
duty. He hesitated, he fell. As one has said, 
" a man may unsettle the verdict of his intellect, 
it is at his peril that he tampers with the con- 
victions of his conscience. There are plain cases 
of immediate duty where it is only safe to act at 
once." The instant doing what we know to be 
right is sometimes the only certain guarantee of 
doing right. To fail at the instant, is to lose the 
opportunity forever, and to involve us in injustice 
and wrong. 

Then see what a coward this lack of righteous 
principle made Pilate who perhaps on the battle- 



y6 Pontius Pilate 



field had often faced death without fear. Notice 
how when he realized his moral weakness, and 
his absolute failure to do right he tried to deceive 
himself by the mock heroic act of hand-washing 
to vindicate himself from blood-guiltiness. 
" What paltry expedients have a fascination for 
weak, superstitious, or demoralized men." What 
scrupulosity we often see in criminals. " The 
scruples of unscrupulous men are among the 
marvels of the history of morals." The priests 
would not enter Pilate's palace fearing ceremonial 
defilement, yet they did not hesitate to plot mur- 
der and falsely accuse the innocent. The rulers 
did not scruple to seduce with money a disloyal 
disciple to betray his Master, yet when that dis- 
ciple brought back that money and cast it in the 
Temple they took it and said, " It is not lawful for 
to put it into the treasury because it is the price 
of blood." Pilate washes his hands to attest his 
innocence, yet condemns to crucifixion the inno- 
cent Jesus. Men may endow churches, build 
hospitals, and erect colleges, yet not hesitate to 
wring millions out of the sweat of underpaid 



Pontius Pilate 77 



labor. They may give solid gold communion 
services to churches, yet the very purchase- 
money of these services may be dishonestly 
gained. The pity of it all is that this act of 
hand-washing — actual and metaphorical — is 
worthless. It but adds hypocrisy to crime. In 
the case of Pilate it was the seal of hopeless sur- 
render, and the complete demoralization of his 
life. He became an accomplice in the judicial 
murder of the innocent prophet of Galilee, Jesus 
of Nazareth, the Son of God. 

The life of Pilate may be summed up as a 
tragedy of moral weakness. It is a witness to 
the truth, that when tried, often against his will, 
his knowledge, his judgment, the morally weak 
man will prove unjust, cruel, unfaithful, cowardly, 
and that moral weakness may be a " source of 
crimes no less awful than those which spring 
from deliberate and reckless wickedness." The 
history of some of England's kings is a sad con- 
firmation of this truth. And the pity of it is, 
that nothing can be done to help such people. 
Hands may be stretched out to save them but all 



y8 Pontius Pilate 



in vain. Pilate's wife did what she could to save 
her husband from the crime he was drifting into. 
She warned and implored him, but her troubled 
dream was unavailing, Pilate was already adrift 
on that moral ocean of unrighteousness where 
the darkness shuts out all light, conceals all di- 
rection ; he was already beyond her reach. It 
was his past which now hindered his doing right 
and saving himself. His past government had 
been unjust, inhuman, corrupt, and he knew it. 
This past the Jews now held as a threat over his 
head, if he did not yield to their demand for this 
innocent life. They might easily fling at him 
the taunt, — what mattered it to him one life 
more — innocent or guilty — to him who had al- 
ready recklessly put many to death. Yet never 
did Pilate struggle so to do right as now ; he 
wanted to do a humane and righteous act, but 
his past misconduct hampered him. Is it not a 
criminal's past which generally frustrates refor- 
mation ? Well has it been said, " There is noth- 
ing which so frustrates good resolutions, and 
paralyzes noble efforts as the dead weight of past 



Pontius Pilate 79 



sins. There are companies in which men cannot 
utter the fine high-sounding things they would 
say elsewhere, because there are present those 
who know how their lives have contradicted 
them. This is the curse of past sin, — it will not 
let us do the good we would." Alas for Pilate ! 
His past now impeded him. He could not do 
right though he wanted to. He was driven 
along against his will, farther and farther into the 
net of circumstances he was dragged, until 
against his judgment and convictions he was 
forced to condemn an innocent man to death. 
He tries to shirk the responsibility of condemn- 
ing the Christ, he washes his hands to maintain 
his innocence, but time has not acquitted him. 
His complicity in the crucifixion can never be 
forgotten. 

" Pilate dreaded to have any act or part in our 
Lord's sentence, and what is the issue ? By a 
marvelous providence this man, whose aim from 
first to last was to escape being identified in any 
way with that sentence, now stands alone forever 
and infamously identified with it. This one 



80 Pontius Pilate 

name of Pontius Pilate is more closely associated 
with our Lord's death than that of any other 
concerned in it. Annas, Caiaphas, the false 
priests, the cruel people, even the traitor, Judas, 
are comparatively set aside. Their names have 
no place in the Christian creed. But there he 
stands in the history of the world and the creed 
of Christendom, for nearly nineteen hundred 
years recorded as having done that deed, which 
to the last he struggled against, and tried to per- 
suade himself he did not do. Every day for 
those centuries— first, from the depths of caves 
and catacombs where the followers of Him 
whom he condemned were compelled to hide — 
then rising to light, swelling, surging, spreading 
over the earth— in the first lispings of childhood, 
in the solemn celebrations of all churches, in the 
last confessions of faith of the dying ; from ten 
thousand times ten thousand voices has the tre- 
mendous witness of all Christendom gone up to 
heaven, ' He suffered under Pontius Pilate.' " 

Unhappy man ending life in an unhappy fate. 
It is the irony of history that events repeat them- 



Pontius Pilate 8x 



selves. Tradition tells us that soon after the 
crucifixion Pilate was recalled to Rome to answer 
to complaints brought against his evil and cor- 
rupt administration. He never returned to 
Judaea, but was banished by the emperor into 
Gaul where at length " wearied out with miser- 
ies " he ended his life with his own hand, and 
died an unhappy suicide. 

And it is to be noted with serious thought, 
that all who were implicated in our Lord's con- 
demnation perished miserably. Judas in his re- 
morse hanged himself. Pilate died a suicide. 
Herod ended his life in exile, and the people 
who in frenzied madness shouted the awful im- 
precation, " His blood be on us and on our chil- 
dren," lived to see the curse fulfilled when Jeru- 
salem, the Holy City, was razed to the ground, 
so that not one stone was left on top of another, 
when, too, in the awful scenes about the city in 
that direful siege, so many Jews were crucified 
that " room was wanting for the crosses, and 
crosses wanting for the bodies." And driven 
from their country, " Still have these wanderers 



82 Pontius Pilate 



seemed to bear from century to century and 
from land to land that burden of blood; and 
still does it seem to weigh ' on us and on our 
children.' " 

But Pilate has his modern counterparts. He 
is but a type of all who possessed of an unworthy 
ambition, are eager for power or place, favor or 
wealth, at any cost, at any sacrifice ; who when 
put to the moral test break down, surrender to 
expediency, deny truth, pervert justice, ignore 
rights. He is a type of all those who are ready 
to surrender the innocent to popular clamor, 
who are ready to abandon a cause or a friend 
when unpopular ; who to win favor will be un- 
just and untrue, who in the mad struggle and 
rush for the world's prizes will crush the help- 
less, who to save themselves will condemn the 
innocent. 

Again Pilate stands to-day as the representa- 
tive of all those morally weak, who shirk respon- 
sibility, who are afraid and dare not, or will not 
decide on some momentous issue and yet must 
do so, and even while they hesitate and shrink 



Pontius Pilate 83 



are sucked into the boiling current of circum- 
stances and are swept away on its foaming tide, — 
helpless, shattered wrecks tossed hither and 
thither, having lost self-respect, name, honor, and 
the very prize which they hoped to win by re- 
fusing to decide. Don't we see these modern 
Pilates by hundreds and thousands abdicating 
their duties, declining their responsibilities, 
wretched waverers, not wishing to do wrong yet 
not daring to do right, hesitating to give a firm 
and definite decision for God and His Christ. 
They are trimmers in religion, hence untrue : op- 
portunists in the world, hence unjust. 

There is but one safeguard for any of us from 
the fate of Pilate. It is to have singleness of pur- 
pose, and a firm grip of the principle of right- 
eousness, — never to hesitate to obey the dictates 
of conscience, never to tamper with the convic- 
tions of the soul, never to hearken to the urgent 
claims of expediency as voiced by the cries of the 
mob, or popular demands ; but daring to face any 
and all consequences, even though doing the 
right drives one naked from home, strips one of 



84 Pontius Pilate 



all the world holds precious, if only conscience 
and honor are left, if only truth and righteous- 
ness have been followed, if only the soul is 
unstained, and life is upright before God and 
man. 



V 
Herod 



And when Herod saw Jesus, he was exceeding glad ; for he 
was desirous to see Him of a long season, because he had heard 
many things of Him ; and he hoped to have seen some miracle 
done by Him. Then he questioned Him in many words but 
He answered him nothing. — Luke xxiii : 8, 9. 

DURING the trial of Jesus before Pilate, there 
comes a lull — for a short while the scene 
changes. For when Pilate heard that Jesus was 
from Galilee, he sent Jesus to Herod, who had 
legal jurisdiction of Galilee, for judgment. But 
we are justified in believing that had Pilate cared 
very much himself to decide the case of Jesus, 
he would have paid little heed to Herod's rights. 
But Pilate was not anxious to condemn Jesus. 
In fact he was eager to get rid of any decision in 
the matter, he therefore readily accepted what 
seemed to him a loophole of escape, a chance to 
shift the decision of the guilt or innocence of 
87 



88 Herod 

Jesus on some one else. Gladly, therefore, Pilate 
sent Jesus to Herod. Now in all probability the 
Roman governor would be rid of all responsi- 
bility. He would escape the guilt of condemn- 
ing an innocent man ; he would escape yielding 
to the murderous cry of the multitude, " Crucify 
Him." It was not justice but moral cowardice 
which brings Jesus before still another judge and 
another court. From the Roman Pilate Jesus 
was thus led to the Idumean Herod who had 
come to Jerusalem to keep the Passover. 

" And when Herod saw Jesus he was exceed- 
ing glad." Was he glad because now he would 
have a chance to do justice to an innocent resi- 
dent of his own jurisdiction, and whom the Ro- 
man governor seemed inclined to yield to popu- 
lar clamor ; was he glad because now he would 
have a chance to pay his homage to the great 
prophet and teacher of Galilee ; was he glad be- 
cause now he would be able to acknowledge him- 
self a disciple, and make some reparation for his 
father's crimes ? 

Why was he glad ? Who was this Herod ? 



Herod 89 



Let us learn who this Herod was, what his an- 
cestry. 

Herod, known as Herod Antipas, was a son 
of Herod the Great, who about thirty years be- 
fore had slaughtered the innocent babes of Beth- 
lehem ; son of that vindictive, cruel, and jealous 
king who in his fury never spared life, not even 
that dearest to himself, who in blind rage and 
suspicion of conspiracy murdered his wife the 
noble Mariamne — the last of the great and heroic 
Maccabean family, and further murdered many 
of his own sons, so that the Emperor Augustus 
is reported to have said, " It is better to be 
Herod's pig than his son." What, I ask, are we 
to expect from the son of such a father ? 

When Herod the Great died his son Herod 
Antipas was made tetrarch of Galilee and Perea. 
On his accession, in accordance with the Herod- 
ian instincts and policy, he had built cities and 
fortresses. He kept court on the lavish scale of 
an Eastern prince, yet adopted many Roman 
usages. He gathered about himself a party 
known as the Herodians, Jewish supporters of 



90 Herod 

his pretensions to the kingship of Israel. He 
had married a daughter of Aretas, but the am- 
bition of Herod to be styled king, his intrigues, 
and his sensuality led him to divorce his wife, 
and to enter into a criminal connection with 
Herodias, the wife of his brother Philip. What 
he hoped would be his gain proved his ruin. 
Herodias became his evil genius. She was am- 
bitious, unscrupulous, cruel and revengeful. 
Step by step she led Herod into crimes that 
otherwise he might never have committed. 

But this notorious, adulterous connection of 
Herod with Herodias — his own niece as well as 
his brother's wife — could not be overlooked by 
the great preacher of repentance then baptizing 
in the river Jordan. The tetrarch is boldly re- 
buked by John Baptist, who said to Herod, 
" It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother's 
wife." Need we wonder at Herodias' hate of 
the Baptist, and at her spirit of revenge when 
thus rebuked. Is it at all surprising that John 
was seized and cast into prison, that Herodias 
would have killed him, were it not that Herod 



Herod 91 



feared the people had he consented to so in- 
famous a deed? 

But notice how crime leads to crime, and how 
the commission of evil is often only deferred 
when life is corrupt and untrue. One day — 
Herod's birthday — he made a great banquet for 
his lords, high captains and chiefs, and after 
fulness of eating and excess of wine, while the 
mad revel of the banqueters was at its height, 
there entered the daughter of Herodias and 
danced before the besotted king and his com- 
pany. In the excitement of the moment and in 
maudlin boastful condition of mind Herod swears 
by an oath to give the princess, who had just 
degraded her princely dignity and virgin 
modesty, whatever she might ask, even to the 
half of his kingdom. The boast was vain, be- 
cause at best the tetrarch was subject to the 
Roman emperor. A hurried consultation with 
her designing mother determines the daughter's 
choice. Now was the mother's opportunity of 
revenge. In came the daughter of Herodias to 
demand her reward, saying, " I will that thou 



92 Herod 

give me straightway in a charger the head of 
John the Baptist." 

What will this driveling tetrarch do now? 
The demand sobers him at once. Will he not 
give anything rather than this, will he not sur- 
render anything rather than commit injustice 
and murder? Will he not plead his intoxication 
of brains and sense as an excuse for release from 
fulfilling such an iniquitous pledge ? We read, 
" The king was exceeding sorry, yet for his 
oath's sake — yes his drunken oath — and for 
their sakes which sat with him he would not re- 
ject her." " And immediately the king sent an 
executioner and commanded the Baptist's head 
to be brought." Thus was sacrificed this noble 
preacher of righteousness, this prophet of holi- 
ness who dared to reprove even kings in their 
courts ; and to this vicious maiden, daughter of a 
wicked and cruel mother, was given the head of 
John the Baptist. 

Can we not easily predict the end ? Herod 
lived on still trying to deceive himself. He had 
even now come up to Jerusalem to keep the 



Herod 93 



Passover, though his life was one great crime, 
and his hands were stained with innocent blood. 
And now while at Jerusalem to keep the 
Passover comes an opportunity he had long de- 
sired, he has at length the chance of gratifying 
this wish, he is to see Jesus of whom he had 
heard many wonderful things, and of whom he 
hoped to see some miracle. Unexpectedly Jesus 
is sent before him for trial. Herod questioned 
the prisoner before him in many words, but 
Jesus answered him nothing. What supreme 
contempt was this from a prisoner ? The king 
could not understand it. But repeated question- 
ing could elicit no answer. The prisoner re- 
mained absolutely silent. And so in desperation 
Herod with his men of war set at naught and 
mocked the innocent sufferer, and after they had 
vented upon Him all the indignities that malice 
and spite could invent, in derision they arrayed 
Jesus in a gorgeous robe and sent Him back to 
Pilate. Herod had already committed one 
murder, may we not believe that the recollection 
of that terrible act of injustice now stayed his 



94 Herod 



hand ; he would send this prisoner away before 
he could be tempted to repeat his former in- 
famous deed. He will not exercise the rights 
which are clearly his — a faint spark of justice yet 

remains, or at least of humanity No ! he 

will not imbrue his hands in blood again. The 
agony of remorse, and the stings of conscience 
are too keen and harrowing for him to desire to 
add any pangs to his already tortured soul ; he 
will send the prisoner back to Pilate. 

But there was no repentance in this act ; and 
though Herod was not actively guilty of our 
Lord's death by assenting to it, yet in a certain 
sense he was negatively guilty in not using the 
opportunity afforded him of acquitting Jesus 
when it was in his power to do so. And his 
end, like that of others connected with the 
crucifixion of Jesus, was disastrous. Urged by 
the ambition of his evil genius, Herodias, he 
went with her to Rome to sue from the emperor 
the title of king ; but a report of his misdeeds 
had preceded him, and instead of being honored 
with the title he sought, he with his wife Herodias 



Herod 95 



was banished to Gaul, where he died in exile and 
disgrace, unwept and unloved. 

And yet Herod's is not a strange or singular 
character. There is nothing unusual about him 
which makes it impossible to repeat him to-day. 
He was vain, weak, sensual, frivolous, curious, 
fond of pleasure, fond of sensation, and at the 
same time superstitious, thinking superstition re- 
ligion. Are these characteristics so abnormal to- 
day ? Have these frailties of Herod been banished 
from our life ? Are there no men with the same 
disposition and character ? It makes little differ- 
ence what the first tendency to sin may be, one 
sin leads to another, and after a while crimes 
are committed that at first one would shrink 
from. 

Ambition and vanity were among the first 
of Herod's temptations to crime. He had all 
the Herodian ambition of his father for power 
and place. Like his father, he was artful, 
cunning, and fond of display, though he lacked 
his father's vigor and genius. His ambition and 
policy led him to imitate Roman habits. In 



96 Herod 



hope of winning imperial favor he paid a slavish 
subserviency to the emperor's whims. He built 
cities and fortresses and named them after the 
emperor and his relatives. Yet in spite of 
Romanizing tendencies he kept the Jewish feasts, 
and observed the ceremonial law. He had two 
faces — one turned to Rome, the other to Jeru- 
salem. It was this cunning which drew from 
our Lord the exclamation concerning Herod, 
" Go tell that fox." Have we not two faced men 
and women to-day — one face turned to God, the 
other to the world ? 

Again we notice in Herod a fondness for 
sensation and the curious. When he heard of 
the miracles of Jesus he wished to see some 
miracle wrought. Pilate's sending of Jesus to 
him for examination was just the thing to gratify 
his love of the curious. Here was the chance of 
a new sensation, something he had longed for. 
His court had been haunted by singers, dancers, 
jugglers. They had ceased to possess novelty. 
But the presence of Jesus was something which 
promised a sensation far surpassing any former 



Herod 97 

sensation. " He was exceeding glad to see 
Jesus." Now he would have a chance to behold 
this miracle worker display His skill. The king's 
request could only be construed as a compli- 
ment. He put Jesus " on the level of a new 
dancer or singer ; he looked on His miracles as a 
species of conjuring or magic." What must have 
been Herod's surprise when the prisoner not only 
did not exhibit His miraculous powers, but did 
not even answer the many questions asked. 
What a stinging rebuke, what a complete 
collapse of the king's hopes of amusement. As 
in Herod's case, so in that of many to-day, the 
religion of Jesus is but another form of amuse- 
ment or entertainment, a relief from the dreari- 
ness and tedium of life, a change from the 
monotony of the secular every-day world. 
They go to church to be entertained, or they 
go for some intellectual titillation ; they go to 
hear fine music, or they go for aesthetic gratifi- 
cation afforded by ornate ritual, and because they 
have been in what is called a church they some- 
how fancy they are religious, as if a church 



98 Herod 



sanctified religion, instead of religion sanctifying 
a church. In such cases where has been the 
communion of the soul with its God ; where has 
been any divine voice speaking to that life ? Just 
as when Christ was questioned in many things 
by Herod and remained silent, so in these cases 
Christ does not speak. Is not the retribution for 
sensation in religion the consequent sterility of 
result, the manifest absence of spiritual power, 
the utter lack of inspiration and of stimulus to 
correct and guide lives into truth and righteous- 
ness ? Those who come for sensation come not 
for God's sake, but only to seek their own amuse- 
ment or the gratification of curiosity. Is it sur- 
prising if God is silent and answers nothing? 

But love of sensation was not all. Herod's 
infamous connection with Herodias proved him 
to be without conscience or regard for the purity 
and sanctity of life. Amid the licentiousness of 
those days, the court of Herod and the king 
himself set the example of profligacy and wan- 
tonness. By his conduct Herod defied all moral 
law. He gave himself up to gross and sensual 



Herod 99 



indulgence, and by the revels of his court he 
sanctioned the wildest license. I suppose it is 
impossible for us to realize the abandonment of 
the morals of those days of which an apostle 
wrote that " it is a shame even to speak of those 
things which are done of them in secret " : and it 
is quite possible to believe that the same apostle 
would give little countenance to the publication 
of our modern moral scandals that so often dis- 
figure our public press, and are scattered broad- 
cast over the land. 

But with all his immorality — as so often is 
the case in crime — there was a haunting super- 
stition in Herod's life, and a false and vain show 
of religion. We read that after Herod had im- 
prisoned John for rebuking his criminal conduct, 
the king would from time to time send for the 
prisoner, and heard him gladly, and did many 
things at John's bidding, — yet he did not put 
away Herodias whose connection with him was 
the one foul crime which was poisoning his life. 
Yet in spite of this life Herod thought himself 
religious. " He retained his vices, yet took an 
LofC. 



Herod 



interest in heavenly things." He was scrupulous 
about rites and ceremonies, he was curious about 
religious matters, he was ready to question Jesus 
about His teaching. Even now he was in Jeru- 
salem to keep the Passover. Yes, Herod was 
quite strict in the observance of Jewish cere- 
monial law, no matter what he did in regard to 
God's moral law. But it is one thing to talk 
about religion, or to be curious about religious 
forms and ceremonies, it is another thing to be 
religious. Our apparent religiousness may man- 
ifest itself in " questions in many words." We 
want to know, — but why ? Is it to believe, and 
then to put belief into practice, or only to gratify 
curiosity, or to deaden remorse ? Do you sup- 
pose Herod intended to do anything if Jesus had 
bidden him ? Do you think he had the slightest 
idea of conforming his conduct to any appeals 
Jesus might make? So with many to-day. 
They profess to have doubts, they are skeptical, 
they ask many religious questions, but do they 
ask to remove doubts, do they inquire that they 
may win faith, or only to gratify their taste for 



Herod 101 



dialectics, to find occasion for argument, to ex- 
hibit their logic or rhetoric, to see if they cannot 
overthrow the evidences of the Christian teacher ? 
The purpose of inquiry may not be at all to 
know Christ and His truth, but to show them- 
selves off; not to reform life, but to inform the 
mind ; not to change the heart, but to gratify 
the intellect ; not to redeem the soul, but to dis- 
play pride. In such cases the only answer is the 
answer of silence. Let our adversary try to 
shame us into retort, even as Herod tried to pro- 
voke Jesus ; but as our Master did, so should 
we, we should I think always treat the question 
of frivolous curiosity even though it be on relig- 
ion with absolute silence. 

Then most pitiable of all, Herod was weak, yet 
like most weak men did not want to be thought 
weak. When he had sworn with an oath to 
give the dancing daughter of Herodias even the 
half of his kingdom, he little thought it would in- 
volve him in the violation of justice, and the 
murder of the innocent. Hence when he was 
asked for the head of John the Baptist, the weak 



102 Herod 

and cowardly king dare not repudiate his oath, 
or stand out against the demand. In the pres- 
ence of his guests all waiting to hear what reply 
he might make to the infamous demand, he 
would maintain what seemed consistency even 
though it led to crime. It was the forced and 
spurious show of courage of the coward. But 
notice how involuntary conduct in sudden and 
unexpected emergencies is often one of the 
truest tests of character and life. When one is 
taken unawares, suddenly tempted or tried, then 
the real habitual disposition, tendency, belief, or 
character is brought out. This test is like the 
flash light in darkness, a sudden and instantane- 
ous revelation of life which under the cloak of 
convention and external conformity, propriety or 
habit is often concealed not only from others, 
but also from self. To be confronted unexpect- 
edly with the need of a decision, act, or issue is 
often a revelation of pitiable weakness as op- 
posed to formal strength, of actual unbelief as 
opposed to formal faith, of unmitigated selfish- 
ness as opposed to outward courtesy. Unfaith- 



Herod 103 



ful to his God and to his conscience, not ashamed 
of any crime or sin, Herod would yet be faithful 
as he thought to his half-drunken oath, and 
appear honorable and true before his compan- 
ions. What honor ! as honorable to tell a 
second lie in order to conceal the first, as hon- 
orable to steal with which stealings to win a 
reputation for generosity, as honorable to take 
another's life in a duel after having first insulted 
him. Honor ! Nay — criminal weakness and 
cowardice. " It was not so much Herod's regard 
for the oath which he had taken, but his shrink- 
ing from the taunt, or whispered jest, or con- 
temptuous gesture of the assembled guests if 
they should see him draw back from his plighted 
word. A false regard for public opinion, for 
what people will say or think of us in our own 
narrow circle was in this as in so many other in- 
stances an incentive to guilt instead of a re- 
straint." 

Have we escaped the weak cowardly fear of 
what people will say or think of us, thus often 
impelling us to do wrong when we know it so to 



104 Herod 

be ; have we escaped thinking ourselves religious 
simply because for various reasons —whether of 
curiosity or sensation, intellectual gratification or 
superstition, worldly advantage or propriety— 
we may be found in God's house joining in His 
worship or singing His praises though this relig- 
ious observance produce no vital effect in our 
life in promoting truth and righteousness, justice 
and honesty ? Have we gained purity of thought 
and life, though we have escaped the actual lusts 
of the flesh, and the commission of sensual 
deeds ? Let us test ourselves by our involuntary 
conduct, our unexpressed wishes, our concealed 
thoughts. Let us remember that there are 
Herods not only without but within the church. 
Where do we stand ? 



VI 

Barabbas 



VI 

Uarabbas 

Ye have a custom that I should release unto you one at the 
passover ; will ye, therefore, that I release unto you the King of 
the Jews ? Then cried they all again saying, not this man but 
Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber. — John xviii : 39, 40. 

THE crisis of our Lord's Passion culminated 
when to the people was offered by Pilate 
the choice, " Whom will ye that I release unto 
you ? Barabbas or Jesus, which is called Christ ? " 
We can imagine the intense anxiety of the 
Roman governor as he put this question to the 
assembled multitude. We can believe that weak 
and vacillating as he was, he must have hoped 
the people would not hesitate to choose Jesus. 
Were they not Jews, waiting anxiously for the 
Messiah ; did not these crowds only a few days 
before go into rapturous ecstasies over this same 

Jesus as He came from Bethany to Jerusalem ? It 
107 



io8 Barabbas 



was only natural that the Roman governor should 
believe that they who a few days before had cut 
down palm-branches to spread them in the way 
of this Prophet of Galilee would be only too glad 
now to demand His release and freedom. 

We can imagine, too, the intense excitement 
of the chief priests and elders who had accused 
Jesus before Pontius Pilate; how anxious they 
would be that the multitudes should decide for 
Barabbas the robber, not Jesus the prophet. 

We can imagine, again, how anxious must 
have been the disciples of Jesus, if any mingled 
with the crowds before the governor's palace. 
Would the multitude choose Jesus their Master, 
or Barabbas the murderer ? What a tumult of 
anxiety must have heaved in the heart of John 
the beloved disciple, if he now stood in the 
crowd waiting for the mob to decide his Master's 
fate. How anxious must Peter have been, if he, 
too, was present in that raging rabble, and be- 
held his Lord whom only a few hours before he 
had so shamefully denied. And those others 
that had fled — Andrew, Thomas, James and the 



Barabbas 1 09 



rest, — had they rallied courage to mingle in this 
shouting, moving mass before the governor's 
palace ? Had they seen from a distance their 
Master insulted and mocked, buffeted and spit 
upon ? Had they seen Him brought out thorn- 
crowned before the people and heard Pilate's 
speech, " Behold the Man ! " If so, how fear- 
fully anxious and nervous they would be to know 
the decision of this fickle mob in which they 
stood. 

And passing from earth to heaven how anx- 
ious, humanly speaking, must have been the 
Father-heart — God the Father as He too waited 
to know the decision of this heaving multitude 
— what would they do with His only begotten 
Son ? And with the divine anxiety may we not 
couple that of the celestial hierarchy — the angels 
and archangels and all the heavenly host, — who, 
if they rejoice over one sinner that repenteth, 
must have been supremely anxious to know what 
would be the fate of their Lord — the Lamb upon 
the Throne. 

That moment was a supreme moment in the 



HO Barabbas 



world and heaven. It seems as if the universe 
would cease its motions to listen with awe for 
the decision that was to come — the reply that 
was to be given to the governor's question. 
Upon this answer depended vital and irrevocable 
issues of time and eternity. Upon this answer 
hung the immortal destinies of countless souls. 
Upon the answer of man hung the fate of the 
Son of God. What a moment in the world's 
and man's history ! Can we not believe that 
everything created would pause and hush in this 
solemn anxious moment! And hark! Now 
comes ringing from ten thousand throats in 
hoarse, mad cry, and mighty roar, in a shout full 
of wild rage, and angry tumult, heard above 
every other noise, " Away with this fellow — 
crucify Him, crucify Him. Not this Man but 
Barabbas." Ah ! irrevocable doom, irreparable 
choice ! The world, as Adam, is once more tried, 
and has once more fallen. The old Adam has 
spoken in his sons' wild cry, " Not this Man but 
Barabbas." The choice has revealed the sinful 
nature, and the diabolical passions of man. 



Barabbas 



Barabbas or Jesus ? Who were they ? The 
sacred writers tell us little of Barabbas, but what 
little they do tell stamps him indelibly. He was 
a notable, i. e., a notorious prisoner, conspicuous 
among criminals, well known perhaps in the land 
for his character and deeds. He had been 
guilty of insurrection and sedition. In his sedi- 
tion he had committed murder ; in his insurrec- 
tion he had probably pillaged — for we read 
" Barabbas was a robber." Bandit, robber, in- 
surrectionist, murderer, he was noted, he was 
feared. Now he was safely lodged in prison. 
His lawless career was checked. His robberies, 
his murders were now ended. The prison, if 
anywhere, was the safe place for him, and peace- 
ful citizens could now breathe more freely, and 
dwell more securely. Yes. Barabbas was a 
notable prisoner, one whom we would scarcely 
wish to see at liberty. 

Barabbas or Jesus? Whom would they 
choose ? Surely it would seem there could be 
no second thought when the characters of the 
two men were known. For on the other hand 



Barabbas 



who is Jesus, the other prisoner whom the chief 
priests wished condemned? Only a few years 
before there burst upon the people of Judaea 
and Galilee a new teacher known as Jesus of 
Nazareth. It is true He did not have the regular 
rabbinic training. He did not have the sympa- 
thy or support of the religious leaders. Still He 
taught as one having authority. His teaching 
had attracted thousands. His gracious words 
had comforted many sad hearts. His parables 
had opened new meanings in life. His presence 
had aroused new motives, desires, and inspira- 
tions. Then His labors had not been confined 
to teaching. He had also healed. Yes wonder- 
ful had been His healing power. Lepers were 
cleansed, the blind received sight, the lame made 
to walk, all manner of sickness and of disease 
were healed by this Prophet of Nazareth. Death 
itself was overcome — for even the dead He had 
raised to life. Further the forces of nature were 
under His control. Water He had turned to 
wine. With five loaves and two fishes He had 
fed five thousand. The raging blast, and tu- 



Barabbas 1 1 3 



multuous waves He had quieted with His words, 
" Peace be still ! " At His command the nets let 
down into the sea were drawn up with fish full 
to breaking. His whole life had been one of 
comforting, teaching, and beneficent mercy. 
Teacher, healer, prophet, Saviour, He had de- 
voted all His powers for the benefit of His 
people. 

Here then was the choice presented to the 
people, — " Whom will ye that I release unto 
you, Barabbas or Jesus which is called Christ ? " 
— a murderer or a Saviour, a robber or a restorer, 
one who had struck terror into people's hearts, 
or One who comforted His people's griefs and 
sorrows ? Could there be any reasonable doubt 
that the people would choose Jesus ? Was not 
the governor's expectation natural ? But woful 
to man's hopes — even here as so often the unex- 
pected happens — the vehement cry is returned, 
" Not this Man but Barabbas." 

What a choice this of Barabbas for release in- 
volved. It was a choice of violence instead of 
mercy, lawlessness instead of law, rebellion in- 



14 Barabbas 



stead of loyalty, crime instead of rectitude, the 
guilty instead of the innocent, a robber instead 
of a benefactor, a murderer instead of a Saviour. 
Could right be more completely crushed, and 
wrong be more triumphantly victorious in such a 
choice? So unnatural, so unexpected Pilate 
would think, we too would think. The choice 
stuns us, upsets all our notions of justice. We 
believe such a decision cannot be natural. We 
shudder at it, we resent it, we repudiate it with 
all our heart and might. We are ready to con- 
demn both Pilate and the people. Is this not 
so ? But pause. Consider the choice more 
carefully, measure it by the history of the world, 
and the experience of life — yea even of our own 
limited experience — and is the choice " Not this 
Man but Barabbas," so strange, unexpected, or 
unnatural ? 

The choice men make is representative of their 
wishes, a revelation of their desires, a key of their 
inmost heart. We have certain stereotyped 
forms for conduct — formal and perfunctory — by 
which we measure the actions, wishes and choice 



Barabbas 1 1 5 



of others, and when these fail to come up to this 
formal standard we are ready to accuse and to 
blame. But how is it when we apply the same 
standard to ourselves ? Do we not see the same 
failure, the same inability to rise to the plane to 
which we had expected others to rise ? Yet in 
our own case does it seem unnatural, unexpected 
if we fail ? Do we not excuse our failure by ad- 
ducing extraordinary circumstances, calling our 
case exceptional ? Was then the choice of Barab- 
bas instead of Jesus so strange ? The very fact 
that we have a choice involves selection, the tak- 
ing one, and leaving the other. And if we con- 
sider the choice of Barabbas, its unexpectedness 
disappears when we remember the occasion of it, 
and the influences which determine choice. 

It was the custom for the governor to release 
at the passover any prisoner the people might 
demand. This was a yearly privilege. Hence 
when this particular year the people had the 
usual choice offered them, they would exercise 
their right in the same way as in times past. 
Were they to know that the choice this particu- 



1 1 6 Barabbas 



lar year was so momentous, so fearful for time 
and eternity ? Were they to know the supreme 
importance of the occasion and the great need 
of exercising their choice justly, righteously ? 
Would they not be governed this year by the 
many motives that had governed them in past 
years ? Would not the same influences be 
brought to bear, would not the same party feel- 
ing, or religious prejudices be appealed to as in 
former years ? Would not the party leaders and 
managers, — the chief priests and rulers — deter- 
mine how the people should choose, and would 
not the people simply accept, and by their choice 
register this decision ? Now, I ask, is this un- 
natural, unexpected ? How is it with us ? It is 
election time. The political issues are before us. 
How do people act ? How vote ? Do they con- 
sider the paramount and supreme interests of 
their city, state, or country ? Do they vote ac- 
cording to fixed convictions of righteousness and 
truth ? Do they place principles before party, 
patriotism before partisanship, country before in- 
dividuals? Let some one outside — some wise, 



Barabbas 117 



disinterested and impartial observer watch to see 
how we act Do we not go according to our 
wont, and even though the question before us be 
of vital importance to our welfare, do we not 
choose and vote, not according to the importance 
of the question or the issue, but as we have al- 
ways done — submit our wish and our choice to 
the influences that have in past years directed 
and controlled us ? Do not a few leaders gener- 
ally decide for the mass, while we do no more 
than register their decision ? Was it then so im- 
portant to the mob before the governor's palace 
whom they chose — Barabbas or Jesus ? What 
was the ruler's choice, who was their candidate ? 
Did not the chief priests urge the people to 
choose Barabbas ? The people had always obeyed 
them before, why not now ? Why should they 
now differ from their leaders and choose differ- 
ently ? Of course they voted according to their 
leader's dictation and cried, " Not this Man but 
Barabbas." 

Was this choice, then, so unnatural? We 
look at this throng, and hear its cry after these 



1 1 8 Barabbas 



many centuries, and we compare its conduct 
with ours to-day, and should we be surprised — 
was its action so strange ? It would have been 
strange had it acted otherwise. The strange 
thing about many irretrievable decisions in life is, 
that the occasions which call for them are not 
strange or singular, but that they come up in the 
regular orderly course of our life in a matter of 
fact way. The choice presents no unfamiliar 
aspect, no unusual face. We have been in the 
same situation before, perhaps frequently, per- 
haps regularly, why then should any single oc- 
casion be so much more important than another, 
why should we be so careful to exercise our 
rights and privileges lawfully, truly, justly in one 
particular instance and not in others ? There is 
no reason. Righteousness is not sporadic. It is 
a habit gained from fixed and firm principles, 
from a steadfast adherence to truth and justice 
on small as well as on large occasions, in little as 
well as in great matters. The crisis comes and 
we know it not, and our action will be deter- 
mined not by the importance of the question, or 



Barabbas 119 



the seriousness of the choice, but according to 
our general habit and practice in years past. 
Hence in this choice, made in the regular exer- 
cise of their annual privilege, the Jews decided 
with their eyes open, with perfect deliberation, 
with fair understanding of the facts of the case, 
and the character of the individuals. They 
knew who Barabbas was, and who Christ. But 
they were accustomed to be influenced in times 
past, and now they were still subject to the same 
influence. They were not independent thinkers 
and actors. They did as they were told, not as 
their consciences or their sense of justice might 
direct. We say how weak, how unfortunate. 
But I ask — is it different to-day ? Would we, do 
we act differently ? 

Yes, unfortunate indeed was the choice be- 
cause of its limitation and irreparableness. The 
choice was limited to one — not Barabbas and 
Jesus, but Barabbas or Jesus ? One chosen, the 
other had to be left, one acquitted, the other had 
to be condemned, the one liberated, the other 
had to be crucified. Then, too, the choice so 



1 20 Barabbas 



lightly made was irreparable. There could be no 
undoing of it. It became final for the choosers 
as well as for the one chosen. It fixed the doom 
of the innocent. There was no redress, no ap- 
peal, no escape. The consequences must now 
follow the choice, there was no room for repent- 
ance. The people had " denied the Holy and 
the Just, and desired a murderer to be granted 
unto them." This choice could never be re- 
voked or cancelled. It must stand forever in the 
world's history an irreparable fact. The cry of 
that multitude must forever go ringing down the 
centuries to the limits of time, and echo forever 
in the Christian consciousness. Ah ! that hoarse, 
mad cry must even mount up to the courts of 
heaven, and echo and reecho through those ce- 
lestial arches — " Not this man but Barabbas." 
A murderer released, and the Son of God mur- 
dered. Could any choice be more tragic? 

Had we been in that multitude while the chief 
priests were urging the people to choose Barab- 
bas and reject Jesus, we perhaps fondly imagine 
that we would have resisted their influence, we 



Barabbas 121 



would have shown more strength of character, 
greater independence, we would have refused to 
do wrong to an innocent man — our manhood 
and sense of justice would have urged us to stand 
by the guiltless, we would have chosen Jesus, we 
would have rejected Barabbas no matter what 
others did. As we read the sacred story and the 
tragic crime do we not lament the blindness as 
we call it of the people, and wonder at their wil- 
ful conduct so pitiably weak, so unjust? Had we 
been there we say we never could have done as 
that riotous mob, nor countenance their action. 
Yet I ask are there not mobs to-day ? Do not 
riot, injustice, and persecution of the innocent 
and harmless continue ? Again in our life in the 
world, in our business, pleasures, ambitions, in 
the mad chase for wealth, influence, or power, in 
the hot pursuit to gratify our lusts, desires, and 
appetites, do we not hear the question put to us 
" Barabbas or Jesus ? " Life is a perpetual inter- 
rogation. We are continually confronted with 
the choice of truth or falsehood, justice or injus- 
tice, sacrifice or indulgence, holiness or sin — 



122 Bar abb as 



what are they but the repeated question, " Jesus 
or Barabbas ? " 

What is life to-day for many but the complete 
spiritual shipwreck of their souls, — the absolute 
abandonment of Jesus ? How many, when the 
choice is offered, refuse to become a disciple of 
Jesus ; who influenced by the thought or actions 
of friends and acquaintances will have nothing to 
do with Him ; who virtually by their deeds say 
as loudly as did the Jews of old with voice," Not 
this man but Barabbas " ? How many Christians 
also abandon their Master by forswearing their 
Christian character, by giving up their Christian 
living, by deserting Christ and taking up with 
the world. 

Ah ! there comes to every life to-day the 
choice, and with so many it is Barabbas, not 
Christ. We reject the Christ every time we per- 
secute the innocent, deliberately do them injus- 
tice, and hurry them to ruin or death by our in- 
iquitous treatment. Do we want to be put to the 
test to-day, do we want to choose ? Would we 
choose Jesus if offered to us, would we have done 



Bar abb as 123 



so nineteen hundred years ago ? Ask yourselves 
how your lives compare with His holy life, how 
you prepare to follow in His holy footsteps? 
Ask yourselves how much joy it gives you to 
imitate His life of patience, gentleness, sacrifice, 
surrender ? Ask yourselves how you love holy 
men, holy places, holy things, how cheerfully you 
obey the commands of God, how gladly you re- 
sign the pleasures of this earth, how detached 
you live in this life? Yes, ask yourselves how 
much does the thought of God, and the love of 
God enter into your hearts to displace the love 
of the world ? To what poor have you broken 
your bread; to what naked have you given 
clothing ; to what sick have you given comfort ; 
to what persecuted innocent ones have you given 
shelter, sympathy, assistance; how have you 
stood for the truth, for justice, for right ? Ask 
yourselves how you have relieved the distressed, 
the friendless, the vile of this earth — the publi- 
cans, the sinners, the outcasts of life ? What have 
you done for them, any one of you for any one 
of these ? Answer these questions, and the true 



Barabbas 



reply will determine whether if you had been in 
that mob, at that Passover season in Jerusalem, 
whether you would have stood by the innocent 
Christ or shouted to condemn Him. Put to the 
test now even as then, and the shouts of num- 
bers to-day is the same as of old, as vehement, 
as cruel, as blasphemous — " Not this man but 
Barabbas." 



VII 

The Meaning of the Cross (Good Friday) 



VII 
Sl)e Meaning of % Cross (<ioob Irioag ) 

They crucified Him. — John xix: 18. 
E Christians talk much of the cross, it is 



w 



a question whether we bear it much. 
We talk of its shamefulness, do we realize it? 
The cross is not a theory, but a fact, not a poetic 
speculation but a cruel reality, not an ornament 
but a mode of daily discipline, not simply a sym- 
bol to be put upon our altars and placed above 
our churches, but an experience to be stamped 
into our lives. 

The distance in time between Calvary of the 
first century and this twentieth century, the famil- 
iarity with the thought of the cross has greatly 
blurred for us its awfulness and humiliation, its 
agony and its shame. As one of our modern 
writers has said, " Perhaps the simplicity of the 

symbol has cast a glamour over the modern mind 
127 



128 The Meaning of the Cross 

and blinded us to its strenuous meaning. Art, 
for instance, with an unerring instinct of moral 
beauty, has seized the cross and idealized it. It 
is wrought in gold and hung upon the neck of 
light-hearted beauty ; it is stamped on the costly 
bindings of Bibles that go to church in carriages ; 
it stands out in bold relief on churches that are 
filled with easy-going people. Painters have 
given themselves to crucifixions, and their striking 
works are criticised by persons who praise the 
thorns in the crown, but are not quite pleased 
with the expression on Jesus' face, and then re- 
turn to their pleasures. Composers have cast the 
bitter passion of Jesus into stately oratorios, and 
fashionable audiences are affected unto tears. 
Jesus' cross has been taken out of His hands and 
smothered in flowers ; it has become what He 
would have hated — a source of graceful ideas and 
agreeable emotions. When Jesus presented the 
cross for the salvation of His disciples, He was 
certainly not thinking of a sentiment which can 
disturb no man's life, nor redeem any man's soul, 
but of the unsightly beam which must be set up 



The Meaning of the Cross 129 

in the midst of a man's pleasures, and the jagged 
nails that must pierce his soul." 

The cross was not idealized by the evangelists. 
But we have told to us the stern and awful 
reality of the crucifixion without the veil of 
glamour. There is something most tragic in the 
simple narrative " they crucified Him." 

And now after the lapse of nearly nineteen 
hundred years we ask again the meaning of the 
cross, what does it stand for, what does it 
represent ? 

We will consider what the meaning of the 
cross is in the life of Christ, and next in the life 
of man. 

First, in the life of Christ. The cross haunted 
Him from infancy, its shadow fell upon His 
cradle at Bethlehem. He had to be taken to 
Egypt to escape the murderous wrath of Herod. 
Then during His long interval of seclusion in 
Galilee He was preparing for the cross. His 
outlook was the dim and distant height of 
Golgotha. A well known " work of modern art 
shows Jesus standing at the door of a carpenter's 



1 30 The Meaning of the Cross 

shop and stretching Himself after a long day's 
labor. The setting sun falling on His outspread 
arms makes the shadow of the cross, and carries 
terror into His mother's heart. This attitude of 
the body was typical of the attitude of the soul." 
His face beheld this shadow continually until He 
came face to face with the reality. We ask 
what is the meaning of the cross and the reply 
is, it means sacrifice. Where there is no sacrifice 
there can be no true cross. The true cross, the 
cross of Christ, the cross of the gospels is 
only found in sacrifice. With Christ it began in 
His self-renunciation of the glories of heaven. 
In heaven itself is found the cross. We see the 
beginning of the sacrifice in the offer of the Son 
of God to empty Himself and to make Himself 
of no reputation, to take upon Him the form of 
a servant and to be made in the likeness of man. 
The cross is rooted in the dawn of creation. 
The wood was already in Eden, where was the 
" tree of life." The first earthly step to Golgotha 
was taken in the Incarnation and in the nativity 
at Bethlehem. Calvary is only the culmination, 



The Meaning of the Cross 1 3 1 

the last scene in the world's tragedy of sin and 
salvation. 

Then in the public ministry of our Lord we 
see the doctrine and exemplification of the 
cross. He had no settled home — as He Himself 
said, " the Son of man hath not where to lay His 
head." His is a ministry not for self but for 
others. His life is a sacrifice of time, of strength, 
of service. He is subject to rebuff, to criticism, 
to opposition. He is misrepresented, He is 
persecuted. Not a step did He take which was 
not watched, not a word did He utter which was 
not criticised, not a miracle did He perform 
which was not challenged. His influence with 
the people was perpetually thwarted and 
minimized. 

But if the cross meant sacrifice it also was a 
stumbling block. See how it bars the way to 
advancement. He who carries the cross has few 
comrades, few followers. The chief Cross-bearer 
found this out. How the doctrine and sight of 
the cross scattered the disciples. How they fled 
when faithfulness might mean crucifixion. How 



1 32 The Meaning of the Cross 

soon they abandoned the Man who for nearly 
three years had been preaching to them the 
doctrine of the cross, a doctrine which they pro- 
fessed to receive and to accept. Yes, the cross 
stands for denial and desertion. It is the great 
heart searcher and divider. It reveals the real 
state of feeling, it proves or disproves easy 
profession. 

Then once more the cross in the life of Christ 
stands for the endurance of injustice. Perfidy 
and covetousness had betrayed Him ; envy had 
plotted His destruction ; political expediency de- 
livered Him up to be crucified. One cannot rise 
up from the reading of the crucifixion without 
being impressed with its extreme injustice. We 
read that Pilate the Roman governor was anxious 
to release Jesus. Three times he proposes to 
release the prisoner against whom no just ac- 
cusation can be brought, whose whole bearing 
presented a wonderful combination of innocence, 
courage, and patience, but each time the roar of 
envy and injustice drowned the half hearted 
proposal of release : — " Crucify Him," was 



The Meaning of the Cross 133 

shouted more vehemently than " I will therefore 
chastice Him and release Him." The cross 
means the endurance of injustice, and surrender 
to the spite and malice of persecutors. 

Then once more the cross in the life of Christ 
stands as the eternal witness of God's love for 
man. It testifies to His unwearied appeal to 
man ; it reveals the divine method of reconcilia- 
tion. 

Consider now what the meaning of the cross 
is in human life. What it must mean in the life 
of each of us, in your life, in my life. It is not 
a toy or ornament, it is not some poetic symbol 
but a stern and cruel reality in life. It reverses 
the whole human conception of life by the in- 
troduction of a new principle that the conquest 
of life is attained only by the sacrifice of life, 
that we gain life by its surrender, that the cross 
is to be taken up daily and borne forward. Only 
a divine example could make such a principle 
acceptable. The world's method and principle 
would be to reject the cross, and to repudiate the 
principle of sacrifice of self. It would fight 



1 34 The Meaning of the Cross 

against surrender of self for others. It would 
insist not on humility but on sovereignty, not on 
meekness but pride, not on forgiveness but 
revenge. Sacrifice is not an earthly idea. Its 
birthplace is heaven, its originator is God. It 
has been transplanted from heaven to earth, it 
has been planted in the hearts of men by the 
planting of the cross on Calvary. 

Again the cross in human life stands for the 
awfulness and reality of sin, and the need of 
salvation from sin. There might have been for 
all we know other methods had God chosen 
them— but He has chosen only one method for 
man's salvation, namely through the cross of His 
Son. " There is no salvation of the soul nor 
hope of everlasting life but in the cross." And 
how real and how awful must sin be when it can 
be removed only by the death of the innocent, 
the just suffering for the unjust, the Son of God 
becoming Man to redeem man. Interpret sin 
in the light or rather gloom and darkness of 
Gethsemane and Calvary, and do we not realize 
then its fearful reality, and the infinite sacrifice 



The Meaning of the Cross 135 

offered to redeem man from its consequences 
and power? What sort of attitude should it 
cause us to take to sin, how Calvary must make 
us hate and abhor sin. 

Then again the cross in human life means a 
new standard, and a different method. It stands 
in eternal opposition to the world's ways, thoughts, 
ideals. At His trial our Saviour said, " My king- 
dom is not of this world," meaning that His 
methods, His habits, His standards were differ- 
ent from those of the world. Think of some of 
the precepts of the divine kingdom where the 
cross is the standard. " Whosoever will be great 
among you let him be your minister, and whoso- 
ever will be chief among you let him be your 
servant." Again " whosoever exalteth himself 
shall be abased, and he that humbleth himself 
shall be exalted." Or again, "what is a man 
profited if he gain the whole world and lose his 
own soul," and once more, " whosoever will save 
his life shall lose it, and whosoever shall lose it 
for My sake shall find it." Yes, the cross in 
human life means that we must change our 



136 The Meaning of the Cross 

natural conceptions of greatness and honor, 
rewards and successes. That another judgment, 
another standard are involved in the entrance of 
the cross into human life. And what is it makes 
it so hard in the world to-day for us to reconcile 
ourselves to life? Is it not that theoretically- 
accepting the cross we have not accepted its 
standard and method ? We are trying to invite 
into our home God and Mammon, we are trying 
to entertain them at the same time. Is it a 
wonder that discord reigns, that we feel the 
struggle and the conflict, that we are tossed 
now here, now there. Ah ! why not end this 
wretched strife ! Why not realize that the 
standard of the cross and that of the world are 
incommensurable — that one looks to eternity, the 
other to mortality, that one looks to character, 
the other to pleasure, one looks to sacrifice, the 
other only to gratification. 

Then, too, the entrance of the cross into life, 
as it reveals the awfulness of sin, reveals also the 
need of righteousness and holiness. It is one 
thing to realize our degradation and disgrace, it 



The Meaning of the Cross 1 37 

is another thing to remove them. Thus the 
realization of sin is but one step in the way of 
the cross, the full path must lead to sanctification. 
Reconciliation by the cross involves a changed 
attitude to God and a changed nature. The 
sinner must become a saint, the love of sinning 
must change to the love of righteousness, enmity 
to God must change to love to Him. 

How much the cross means when we begin to 
think of it. And does it not result in conse- 
quences to the individual — to those who are 
bearing their crosses after their Great Leader ? 
Yes. If we bear our cross, does it not involve 
for us a crucifixion likewise ? Oh, brethren, we 
who talk of bearing our crosses, how often we 
complain when we come to our crucifixion, and 
yet, I ask, if you have not already thought of it, 
I ask why are you bearing the cross if it be not 
that you must be crucified upon it, must bear all 
its shame, humiliation, pain and desertion ? " The 
disciple is not above his Master, it is enough that 
he be as his Master." And when God or even 
the world calls us to our crucifixion, the cruci- 



1 38 The Meaning of the Cross 

fixion of our hopes, our joys, our successes, when 
on the cross we are raised by suffering, by loss, 
by bereavement, what is this but following in 
the footsteps of your Saviour ? What is it but 
the proof of the truth that if we are to rise with 
Christ we must also be crucified with Him? 
Think of this at times, brethren, when some 
mystery of life darkens your home, and you 
seem to stand baffled, alone, deserted, or per- 
secuted, remember that you as a disciple of the 
crucified as well as risen Christ must enter your 
Gethsemane and climb your Calvary. The pain- 
ful journey, and the heavy load are not all. The 
jagged nails must pierce you, and you must be 
lifted up for the scorn and derision of men. 

Will not this likeness of suffering to Christ's 
enable you to interpret much of the sorrow, many 
of the mysteries, many of the wrongs which enter 
your lives ? Think how He had to endure unde- 
served, unjust punishment. You, too, may have 
to endure the same. If you have accepted the 
cross as the standard of your life, then you must 
also accept its consequences. You must take 



The Meaning of the Cross 139 

pattern after the Great Cross-bearer. You must 
endure affliction. You must submit to insult, 
injustice, cruelty, oppression. You must endure 
slander, malice, hate. You must endure denial 
and desertion. You must be willing to forego 
the prizes, the hopes, the successes of this world. 
Yes, even when at times you seem to be reach- 
ing them, and strangely the world is applauding 
you, you must be ready to hear the distant 
murmur forewarning a change when applause 
will be changed to curse. You must prepare for 
the thorns, the nails, the cross. Do you see the 
vision, do you realize the standard ? The cross 
is not a poetic delusion, a historical romance, an 
idealization of suffering ; but it is even now and 
to-day a stern reality, a daily discipline, an 
experience stamped into our lives. They cruci- 
fied Him — the Christ. They may crucify you — 
the followers of that Christ. 



VIII 

Christ's Resurrection the Answer to the 
Enigma of Death (An Easter Sermon) 



VIII 

(prist's Eeanrrotion tlje %\\smx to tl)e (Enigma 
of EDeatf) (2ln faster Sermon) 

For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made 
alive. — I Cor. xv: 22. 

THE great mystery of life and of death is a 
mystery we cannot escape. A time of 
health, or prosperity, or pleasure may dim or 
veil this mystery for a while, but some severe 
sickness, some loss of beloved friend, relative, or 
child; the waning of strength, the lengthening 
of age, the swift whitening of hair ; the deeper 
and deeper furrowing of the lines of care and 
time on the face ; the growing up of the young 
to maturity whom we have all along been think- 
ing of as infants or children, — these and many 
more circumstances of this changing and fleeting 
mortal life impress us with the fact that our lives 
are being borne on the swift tide of time to that 
unknown land, that soon for us the light of day 
143 



144 Christ's Resurrection 

must fade forever; and so the almost forgotten 
mystery of life and death becomes for us real 
again. Thus we stand face to face with death 
with a suddenness which is almost startling, but 
the mystery remains as impenetrably shrouded 
as ever, and we wonder and fear and hope. 

The outlook on the world is an outlook of life 
always ending in death. Is this all — we ask? 
We look out on the world of nature and we see 
things live to die, we see animals live to die, we 
see men live to die. Is death the finality for 
man? Many answers or attempted answers 
have been given. Surmises, hopes, poetry, 
philosophy, dreams have all been given as an- 
swers, but they have failed to give any answer 
of certainty. At best these answers have only 
been a " maybe." Like a swimmer we drop as 
it were our feet to touch the bottom and find 
none. We try again and again, but still we 
feel in vain. Once more, we send our voice 
out into the void of the past, or we project it 
into the formless future, and we hear an echo 
perhaps of our own question, or else not even an 



Christ's Resurrection 14$ 

echo is heard ; silence prevails. Thus we may- 
ask the world of nature what its answer is and 
we receive no reply. Facts seem to say, in the 
grave is silence for evermore. " In Adam all 
die." And so there has ever been a mournful- 
ness about the mystery of death that has clouded 
the mystery and the joy of life. The shadow 
clings — the ghost will not away. The greater 
the light the deeper the shadow, the madder the 
joy and revelry the more insistent the intrusion 
of the ghost to spoil and mar the joy and mirth 
at the feast. The strongest purposes seem mad- 
ness and a sheer delusion ; the greatest deeds 
seem like writing in the sand by the seashore ; 
the most potent life like a spark of light which 
flashes only to disappear. All life seems so 
broken, unfinished, particularly all individual life. 
That which we severally call " I " we wish to re- 
main " I " forever. But yet in spite of our stormy 
wishes there seems to be a fragmentariness to all 
individual life. Its purpose is so soon cut off, 
its length of days so short at best, its powers 
so weak. Is there no answer to the question of 



146 Christ's Resurrection 

the heart which yearns for some reply ? Ah ! 
the passionate demands and stormy questions of 
men and life — is there no answer to them? 
Must things always be so unsettled, must men 
never know wherefore they are made, must the 
immortal mind be nothing but mortal dust? 
Look everywhere for a reply, and you find none, 
neither in life nor philosophy, nor poetry, nor 
dreams until you come to the religion of the Son 
of God, who to the questions and queries says in 
calm and solemn tones of certainty yet triumph, 
" I am the resurrection and the life." Then 
later come the words of His apostle to assure us, 
" For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall 
all be made alive." The one and only answer 
which has been given without doubt or hesitation 
is the Christian answer; and the only reply to 
the mystery of the fragmentary life of man is the 
risen life of Christ. The resurrection of Christ is 
the type of all human resurrection, it is the full 
and final answer to the enigma that has puzzled 
all ages and all peoples — the enigma of personal 
immortality. 



Christ's Resurrection 147 

Let us consider the mystery of death this 
Easter day — the one day in the year which in 
the midst of a mortal and decaying world can 
buoy us up with immortal hope and joy, can 
open our mouths to sing with triumph, " O death, 
where is thy sting, O grave, where is thy vic- 
tory?" What has the teaching of this day to 
say to the question of the fragmentariness of 
human life, and what is its answer to the enigma 
of death ? 

Here is a strong life in whose body the blood 
courses with vigorous tide. There is no sugges- 
tion of weakness or decay. The eye is bright, 
the step is firm, the will dominant. Yet in a 
moment without a minute's warning all this fair, 
strong, godlike life is ended. The vigorous 
strength has gone, that powerful form is helpless, 
the myriad purposes and plans are ended, that 
warm beating heart is cold. The body that 
could stand and defend itself is now utterly help- 
less, unable to resist the insults or the mutilations 
that some envious rival, or some inquisitive anat- 
omist might inflict. We stand and wonder at 



Christ's Resurrection 



it all. And we ask is this all ? We can believe 
that the natural end of weakness, sickness and 
slow decay is death, but can we for strong and 
young life? Is not this sudden cutting off a 
seeming violation of nature, a frustration of the 
design and purpose of life ? Ah ! this fragmen- 
tary strength of man, what use is it, if this be 
the end, the only end ? We ask the seers and 
wise men, the astrologers and soothsayers is this 
all, and they shake their heads and say, " we do 
not know." To the sorrowing relatives and 
friends who come to them for comfort they can 
offer only hard stones of ignorance and doubt. 
Is there no other answer? And we hear the 
Christian answer rising in the far distance yet 
drawing nearer and nearer until it fills all time 
and all life, " For as in Adam all die, even so in 
Christ shall all be made alive." The unhesitat- 
ing and undoubting answer to the tear stained 
parents, children or friends is " thy child, thy 
parent, thy friend shall rise again." 

Or once more, here is one whose thoughts 
have changed the face of the world, renewed 



Chrisfs Resurrection 149 

institutions, nations and peoples. He has stirred 
the hearts of men to break through the fetters of 
superstition, he has led them into truth, he has 
filled them with hopes, joys, aspirations and 
courage that enable them to risk all and dare all 
— even to sacrifice life itself — to maintain spirit- 
ual liberties which have dawned upon them. 
And in time he who thought these thoughts, and 
spoke these words, and moved these hearts dies, 
as we say. His thoughts have become the prop- 
erty of man for all time. They are an immortal 
inheritance. Yet, I ask, is it reasonable that 
thoughts should last beyond the mind which 
created them, that words should be greater than 
their speaker, that the idea should be immortal 
and the idealist mortal ? 

Further here are deeds of love and charity 
based on endowments that shall last through 
ages. A church, a hospital, a college, an asy- 
lum — they are endowed so that they shall 
strengthen as the ages lengthen, and widen as 
the generations of men widen, is it reasonable 
that the deed can be greater than the doer? 



150 Christ's Restirrection 

They have all gone — the strong man, the great 
thinker, the masterly genius, the devout alms- 
giver and philanthropist, are they not in all 
cases greater than their work whatever it be ? 
Must they not possess an immortality far be- 
yond anything they ever did ? Think of this 
sometimes, brethren, as you ponder the mystery 
of life and death, and see if it does not afford an 
answer for some of the enigmas and problems 
that perplex you. Is not the thinker always 
greater than the thought ; is not the doer always 
greater than the deed ; must not the worker pos- 
sess a larger immortality than his immortal 
work ; is not the inspirer always greater than his 
inspiration, must not the idealist be more endur- 
ing than his ideal ? 

The fragmentariness of life meets us on all 
sides. What activity does not death end ? Here 
is great capacity, and just as it is developing, 
it is cut short ; here is mental development be- 
gun, and it is suddenly blighted. Here are 
affections and love turning the wilderness into a 
garden, and softening the hard hearts of hate 



Christ's Resurrection 151 

and anger and they too are quenched. Here 
are efforts just begun, it needs only time and the 
master hand to bring them to completion and 
perfection, but while time continues the master 
hand is laid low. Dreams, aspirations, purposes, 
high endeavor, ail are shattered. The noblest 
and the holiest of the sons and daughters of men 
can scarcely begin to run their race ere darkness 
settles upon them and their night has arrived. 
Everything, and every one can get so far and no 
farther; beginnings innumerable are found 
everywhere, but endings, completions, perfec- 
tions, nowhere. Everything is fragmentary. 
We walk as it were in a silent city. On all sides 
we see houses, some large, some small, some 
grand, some mean, some partly finished, some 
only begun ; a foundation laid here, there a wall 
partly up ; again some seem to be almost com- 
plete; but wherever we look we see nothing 
finished, and nowhere is there a workman in 
sight. We walk through the streets and avenues 
of this silent unfinished city exhibiting beauty of 
design and seeming purpose, yet all apparently 



152 Chris fs Resurrection 

deserted. On all sides we see signs of recent 
work, but nowhere a workman — not a voice, 
not a sound. And we ask — is this city begun 
and laid out with consummate skill and design, 
which already displays beauty and grace, which 
even now by these unfinished buildings gives in- 
timations and an idea of the complete purpose, 
is this city apparently deserted never to be com- 
pleted ? Can the mind which planned, and the 
hands which labored, can they abandon what 
they have already begun ? And we reply no ! 
The master mind, or the master workman may 
seem absent just now, but we cannot believe that 
what he has planned on so grand and noble a 
scale and has already begun he will totally de- 
sert. To do so would be to confess failure, de- 
feat, powerlessness. And from what we have 
seen we cannot acknowledge such defeat and 
powerlessness. But one day this city will rise to 
its completion and perfection, and the fully 
matured design will appear in all its beauty, rich- 
ness, and usefulness. Even so is it with life here. 
We walk through it as through a city begun but 



Christ's Resurrection 153 

not completed, and all its frustrations and sudden 
ends, its fragmentariness and incompletion will 
one day be completed in the eternal city of God. 
One great mistake which we nearly all make 
when we approach this mystery of death is the 
limited view we take of life. We call life frag- 
mentary, we forget that here is only its begin- 
ning. But if we look at the life of Christ we 
shall be taught our lesson. How fragmentary 
His life seemed, how little He did, what limita- 
tions hedged His short three and thirty years. 
How incomplete and unfinished we are apt to 
say. But is this all ? Is it not true of Him, and 
so of us, that His earthly life was typical, and 
was but the beginning of His atoning life ? That 
His life goes on to completion, and perfection in 
His risen and ascended life, that at the right 
hand of God He has brought to full fruition the 
fragmentary earthly life? It is the future life 
which is to be the full vindication of God's pur- 
pose, wisdom and love to us. This life is but a 
small part, only a beginning, there beyond shall 
be the further and larger growth, there the ripen- 



154 Christ's Resurrection 

ing and beauty of perfection. Let us lift our 
eyes above the rim of our little horizon of time, 
and peer — though it be but a short distance — into 
the dim and ever widening and lengthening, and 
eternal future. With this thought we shall see 
that to talk of the fragmentariness of human life 
is to talk idly, but that life is continuous and 
goes on forever. 

Again let it be said that as " in Adam all die, 
so in Christ shall all be made alive," is a per- 
sonal answer to the personal question, " Shall I 
live ? " It is the reply to the vain and cruel 
theory of a racial immortality, an answer to the 
dread fear of the loss of personal immortality. 
Brethren, the resurrection of Christ is the answer 
to your individual question, " Shall I rise ? " The 
divine reply is, the resurrection is personal, the 
immortality is personal. We are not to be 
swallowed up at the last into some eternal spirit, 
there to lose forever our identity and personality, 
merged into a quietude of inanition and inaction. 
But for us all eager, hungry, longing for our own 
personal life now, and hereafter, the risen life of 



Christ's Resurrection 155 

Christ says to us, " You and you, each of you 
shall rise again." We each shall rise unmixed, 
and unswallowed. 

And thus for each of us comes a lesson as well 
as hope. We are taught to look far beyond the 
present and the finite. We are taught to think 
of our lives not as some chips or fragments of 
life, hewn it may be from some massive block or 
quarry of life without purpose or end, but as 
having continuity, purpose, and design. We are 
taught to value the present as the birthday of 
eternity, the present as the time for learning our 
steps, crawling and stumbling it may be, but 
learning to walk that so when we pass under the 
veil we shall be ready to enter on that race after 
perfection, and to understand the glorious design 
of God which transcends all human conception or 
thought. " For eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, 
neither have entered into the heart of man the 
things which God hath prepared for them that 
love Him." There shall be life whose length, 
and breadth, and depth, and height passeth all 
human understanding and knowledge ; there shall 



156 Christ's Resurrection 

continue the long and eternal career which here 
we have hoped and panted for with hungry 
hearts, and straining eyes, and bated breath. 
Ah ! Friends, brethren in Christ, what does not 
the Resurrection of Him who died and rose 
again open to us ? Words fail before the sur- 
passing vision, thoughts tremble at the glorious 
prospect, hope even halts ere it dare proceed to 
the realization of its long dream and expectation. 
And so I ask, is not the risen life of Christ an 
answer to explain the fragmentariness of our 
earthly life, does it not solve all mysteries, 
enigmas, and doubts by the sublime hopes, ay, 
by the positive assurance which it offers us ? Do 
we not rise to the height, the daring, the glory of 
immortal beings with such a divine and immortal 
future ? Is not the risen life of Christ a help to 
us to stride over and surmount all difficulties here, 
to rise above the petty trifles which consume our 
lives, and evaporate our thoughts ? Does it not 
also give rest to the aches and pains of the heart 
and soul ? Ah ! does it not soothe the bereaved 
heart, does it not take the sting from the bitter- 



Christ's Resurrection 157 

ness of death itself, to know that as " in Adam all 
die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive " ? 

One great motive we should gain on this 
Easter day, viz., that of immortal hope to cheer 
us when weary, to spur us for greater flights, and 
to nerve us to greater courage and endurance ; to 
lift up our hearts in gratitude, and our voices in 
anthems of joy to the great God, eternal, im- 
mortal, invisible, the King of kings, and Lord of 
lords, whose mercy and love are so boundless and 
constant; to rejoice in the possession of a life 
endowed with such infinite possibilities and ever 
widening scope of entering into the divine life, 
of leaving this earth with its darkness and death, 
until at last on the great day of the general 
resurrection — the great eternal Easter day — we 
may rejoice as we see 

" Out of the shadows of night 
The world rolls into light 
It is daybreak everywhere." 

Then shall we enjoy eternal light in the presence 
of the Eternal God, and eternal life in the light 
of the Eternal Light. 



MAR 9 1903 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: July 2005 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVAT.OM 

111 Thomson Pa* Drive 
Cranberry Township. PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 



